This year’s Fez International Artists Gathering concluded with an urgent message for our times: the future of water lies in our ability to harness the transformative power of art, culture, and community to inspire lasting change.
When the historic city of Fez hosted last week the 7th edition of the International Gathering, the ambitious program underlined the power of art, culture, and community engagement in solving the world’s water crisis.
From academic panels to hands-on workshops, immersive experiences, and riveting artistic performances, the “Water Matters” festival examined the place of water in Morocco’s heritage and its sustainable future from a wide range of angles.
Organized by its co-founder Omar Chennafi, the Fez Gathering brought together everyone from children learning about water through crafts to accomplished artists using their performance and exhibition platforms to speak about water conservation.
“I think it’s important for us to-as you see the program-have different target groups from the children that also work in water through handicrafts, artists with their performances and also exhibitions,” Chennafi declared in an interview with Morocco World News, emphasizing the all-encompassing nature of the event.
Read also: Fez Art Gathering Urges Collective Responsibility to Tackle Water, Climate Issues
The program was intended for a wide range of activities: from intellectual discourse on the intersection of art, culture, and water preservation to hands-on skill-building in traditional Moroccan artisanal practices, such as zellij and plaster carving.
This was an addition to the “Water Rally” itself, which took participants across Fez’s historic medina in search of several fountains that have marked the city’s deep-rooted connection with this resource for centuries.
Amazing installations, performances, and video projections came to the fore as a mainstay of the Fez Gathering; these became strong mediums catalyzing conversations on water conservation. A telling example of such creativity was the “Drops” exhibition by the Spark Collective with shimmering rainfall effects juxtaposed against teardrop patterns on the ground.
The meditative stone-and-water piece by Berlin-based artist Philipp Kodjo-Metz, exemplars of how creative vision can bring into light the critical importance of water, in addition to the documentary directed by Joe Lukawski that narrates the crisis Fez is facing with drought and turbidity of drinking water from the locals themselves.
While Morocco keeps coming to terms with the prospect of long drought and low water, the International Artists Gathering Fez has emerged as a model for how art, culture, and community engagement can chart an increasingly sustainable path forward.
“This edition really celebrates water and also relates it to culture and cultural heritage, and also collective memory that’s related to water,” Chennafi said, underlining the event’s holistic vision of preserving Morocco’s rich natural and cultural legacies.
