Hanane El Ouardani: the synthesis of the personal and the societal

Hanane El Ouardani's work stands out for her unique ability to interweave intimate and personal narratives and perspectives with broader societal and cultural themes. El Ouardani's subjective documentary photography projects are not only aesthetically captivating but also prompt questions about identity, exotism, contradictions and social status. She challenges the viewer to contemplate the complexity of these themes. With her camera, she ventures to public spaces where men play a prominent role and she actively engages in interaction there.

The Dutch-Moroccan photographer was born in the Netherlands with bicultural roots, and her practice reflects a recurring duality: on one hand, an unwavering desire to truly feel at home somewhere, and on the other, embracing her status as an 'outsider' due to the unique perspective it offers her, allowing her to keenly observe differences from a distance. In 2018, she published the photo book 'The Skies are Blue, The Walls are Red’, a visual diary that explores the various layers of a diasporic identity. The book raises questions about representing one's roots without feeling estranged from one's own culture.

During Art Rotterdam, El Ouardani will showcase her work at Prospects: an initiative of the Mondriaan Fonds that showcases work by 86 artists who received financial support in 2022 to launch their careers. The work on display ranges from photography to textile works, video to paintings and performances to sculptures. The exhibition is curated by Johan Gustavsson in collaboration with curator Louise Bjeldbak Henriksen. El Ouardani will present three works there that she created in Kuwait, an introduction to her ongoing research that is currently taking shape. So far, the photographer has captured migrants working in American fast-food chains in Kuwait, which have proliferated since 1991 in the aftermath of the First Gulf War. In doing so, El Ouardani is exploring how cultural exchange translates into the complexities of overconsumption.  

Additionally, she draws inspiration from a set of playing cards developed by the U.S. military during the 2003 invasion of Iraq, to help soldiers identify the most wanted members of Saddam Hussein's regime. The cards were considered provocative and trivializing, and at the same time, they represented a bizarre Americanization of the war — a war whose legitimacy, the 'weapons of mass destruction’, was later found to be unfounded. By 2021, nearly all of the 52 most wanted individuals on the cards had died or been captured, with eleven of them subsequently released.

El Ouardani was born in 1994 and lives and works in Amsterdam. She studied Photography and Design at the Royal Academy of Art in The Hague and her work has been exhibited at notable venues, including the Van Gogh Museum, Unseen Amsterdam, Foto Tallinn and Paris Photo.

During Art Rotterdam, Hanane El Ouardani's work will be on display in the Prospects section of the Mondriaan Fonds.

Written by Flor Linckens