SZ Gallery’s featured artist, Nabil El Makhloufi, melds his Moroccan background with his experiences living and working in Europe, providing a glimpse into the life of those in permanent states of cultural in-betweeness. El Makhloufi combines planes of colors with airy brushwork, giving his paintings a strikingly dream-like property. He captures deeply meditative moments of seen and lived realities with the use of the figure as a representation of quiet alienation and nostalgia.

El Makhloufi’s works question the place of the individual in society. The characters seem, in fact, often alone, even when they are in the middle of a crowd. They always impose their presence. A quiet, serene presence that does not try to shout that it is here to win.

El Makhloufi attended the Art School of Rabat, and after he studied at the School of Visual Arts of Leipzig. His works have been featured in solo and group exhibitions in Frankfurt, Casablanca, London, Dakar and Beirut. He is also the recipient of the 2014 Cité des Arts award, Paris.