Youssef Aït Tazarin

Born in 1977 in Essaouira province (Morocco). Lives and works in Essaouira

Youssef Aït Tazarin, an atypical and rather sober adolescent, began to paint at the age of fourteen. Since then, the artist has developed a visual practice that explores pictorial themes based upon fantastical subjects, expressed in surrealist images. This strangeness is reinforced by an outpouring of colour and synoptic movement, which also evokes timeless symbolism.

Aït Tazarin’s paintings summon an animal kingdom filled with hybrid, often deformed creatures that defy definition. Beasts occupy the entire canvas, leaving no empty spaces between them. Twisting and turning within his curious macrocosms, these representations pull the artist’s compositions into a maelstrom of motion and unusually high tension.

For this mystical artist, the secrets of his art surely lie in the unconscious, where his inner mind explores deep trance states, lucid or creative dreaming, and innovative language to reveal creations that enchant the viewer.

His personalised technique follows a protocol that is both complex and curious. He uses a unique form of pointillism, rigorous to the extreme, in the manner of an ascetic—or maniac—who projects his spirit into a seemingly endless ritualistic journey of initiation.

Youssef Aït Tazarin has shown his work since 1993, first in his native city and later throughout Morocco. His paintings have integrated world-renowned collections.