Artist Lalla Essaydi challenges stereotypes of women in Islamic cultures

THE WASHINGTON POST
By DeNeen Brown,

"Bullets #5," (2009's) by Lalla Essaydi is covered in intricate Arabic calligraphy.
Courtesy of Edwynn Houk Gallery, New York

WASHINGTON DC -- Confined to this lovely but deteriorating house, attended only by servants, a young Lalla Essaydi begins to think about the private spaces that women in the Arab world must inhabit. Her photographs are included in the exhibition “Lalla Essaydi: Revisions,” which opens Wednesday and runs through Feb. 24 at the Smithsonian’s National Museum of African Art. Her work, she says, will become haunted by spaces she inhabited as a child. [link]