Younes Rahmoun: Here, Now is the first survey for multidisciplinary artist Younes Rahmoun. Born in 1975 in Tetouan, Morocco, where he continues to live and work, Rahmoun is a leading figure in contemporary art internationally as well as a dedicated mentor and teacher to subsequent generations of artists in Morocco.
The exhibition explores how Rahmoun’s artistic practice has, since the 1990s, created space for viewers to be in community, together in the here and now, through a focus on formal rigor, iterative processes, and social engagements. Foremost among the exhibition’s themes are nature, place, and landscape; spirituality; migration as a consequence of de/colonization; and art as a premise for coming together. The exhibition invests in multiple locations across Smith: SCMA’s galleries and atrium façade, the Botanic Garden of Smith College, the banks of Paradise Pond, and the MacLeish Field Station in Whately, MA. New site-specific commissions will be exhibited at these locations alongside a selection of major sculptures, drawings, videos, and installations that Rahmoun has made over the past twenty-five years.
Inspired by the artist’s commitment to working collaboratively and creating connections across multiple locations, two partner exhibitions—at La Kunsthalle Mulhouse and Kulte: Center for Contemporary Art & Editions—will open in Mulhouse, France, and Rabat, Morocco, respectively, in 2024.