By Hassan Hajjaj

About this book

"Edited by Katia Hadidian, with essays by Martin Barnes (Senior Curator of Photographs at the Victoria and Albert Museum, London); Dr Linda Komaroff (Curator of Islamic Art and the Department Head, Art of the Middle East at LACMA); Jessie Wender (Photo Editor at The New Yorker) and Mitra M. Abbaspour (Associate Curator in the Department of Photography at The Museum of Modern Art, New York). Now in his mid-career, the acclaimed artist-photographer Hassan Hajjaj has had many lives that inform the work he creates today. This timely publication explores how his upbringing in Morocco and London, his experiences in fashion and interior design, and his adventures in the music industry influence the vibrant colours, joyful spirit, and visual rhythm of his highly sought-after images"--Publisher's description. " Born in Larache, Morocco, in 1961, Hassan Hajjaj left Morocco for London at an early age. Heavily influence by the club, hip-hop, and reggae scenes of London as well as by his North African heritage, Hajjaj is a self-taught and thoroughly versatile artist whose work includes portraiture, installation, performance, fashion, and interior design, including furniture made from recycled utilitarian objects from North Africa, such as upturned Coca-Cola crates as stools and aluminum cans turned into lamps. Turning to photography in the late 80s, Hajjaj is a master portraitist, taking studio portraits of friends, musicians, and artists, as well as strangers from the streets of Marrakech, often wearing clothes designed by the artist. These colorful and engaging portraits combine the visual vocabulary of contemporary fashion photography and pop art, as well as the studio photography of African artist Malick Sidibe, in an intelligent commentary on the influences of tradition in the interpretations of high and low branding and the effects of global capitalism"-- http://www.taymourgrahnegallery.com/artists/hassan-hajjaj