Moroccan artist Lalla Essaydi, currently living in New York City, combines her painting skills with her aptitude for photography to produce this beautiful series called “Harem.” Unlike the idyllic Western associations of the word harem, where scantily clad gorgeous women are anxiously awaiting a man to please, Essaydi’s portrays the Harems of Morocco a bit more realistically and a lot more artistically. Essaydi painted all of the exposed skin her subjects with henna tattoos of Islamic calligraphy of an autobiographical nature. The chosen robes were meant to blend in with the Arabic tiles in the background to represent the way Arabic women are somewhat trapped between their culture and the way that they have been portrayed in Western art. [Read more...]