A low wall covered in flowering bougainvillea, and beyond it ochre fields dotted with trees, with hills on the horizon.

Mâwa Art Space

An artist residency and a place for psycho-corporal practice in Had Dra, in the Essaouira region: 3 spaces to live and work in, in a peaceful and inspiring setting, to create, experiment, share and come together.

One place, four doors

The place welcomes projects of different kinds, which share the space while each keeping its own autonomy.

See these 4 ways of welcoming and acting in detail

Three spaces to host you

A traditional family house, an independent studio and an artistic space with its practice room and its dormitory.

See the three spaces

How the place took shape

  1. White walls, green tiles

    Above a white wall, a row of green tiles edges the roof. Beneath the overhang hangs a lantern of pierced metal.

    • A young worker in paint-stained clothes, standing on a roof edged with green tiles, above a white wall; beneath the overhang, a pierced-metal lantern and a blue door.

  2. The house takes on new colours

    The façades are given a new lease of life: pink render covers the walls, the windows are outlined in white and the shutters are freshly painted in the blue so typical of Essaouira.

    • A pink-rendered building seen from the garden, its windows framed in white under small tiled canopies, terracotta jars along the wall.
    • Under a white ceiling, a worker standing on a bucket paints the top of a pillar; further back, a second one works from a ladder, above a tiled floor covered with dust sheets.

  3. Floors and walls

    The tiling arrives: zellige laid under the canopy, bags lined up along the low wall, and a shower room already fully tiled.

    • Zellige tiles leaning against a pink low wall, beside cement bags, on a tiled floor.
    • Stacked tiles and bags lined up along a low wall, under a canopy with a tiled floor.
    • A shower room with walls fully covered in patterned zellige, with a basin and a shower.
See every stage

Emilie Edelman

“Mâwa” (مأوى): “refuge”, “haven”.

Emilie Edelman is a clinical psychologist and trainer with 20 years of experience. Her clinical work has grown richer over the years, notably through the practice of art therapy and the use of arts-based mediation in care. Nourished by Afro-contemporary dance, passionate about psycho-corporal work and about setting things back in motion (both psychic and somatic), she founded Mâwa Art Space by rethinking her family home in the heart of a douar in the Essaouira region. Surrounded by argan trees and steeped in the tranquillity of rural Morocco, the place is dedicated to artist residencies, workshops, care, the practice of the arts and training.

Discover the place

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Tell us who you are, what you want to do and when: we answer through the same channel.

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