Frauhaus: Moroccan paintings

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I have ten Moroccan paintings hanging at Frauhaus, Chattan Place, Aberdeen. These include paintings from 2025-6, as well as older paintings.

Asilah, medina

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Asilah, a block, oil on card 24.9 x 20.8 cm- available

This is the last of the pictures from Morocco 2025-6. 

With hindsight, we would have spent longer in Morocco and less time in the second leg of the winter trip, in Spain.

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Asilah, a block

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Asilah, a block, oil on card 24.9 x 20.8 cm - available

I`m certain we could have spend more time here in Asilah without becoming irritable.

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This picture is perhaps my favourite of the Asilah set: I like its simplicity.

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Asilah, a garden

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Asilah, a garden, oil on card, 26.6 x 24.6 cm - available

I love the gardens in Morocco.

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Asilah, near the sea

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Asilah, near the sea, oil on card, 20.9 x 25 cm - available

Asilah

Asilah, just 30k south of Tangier, has about 30,000 people. It has a charming, if somewhat tourist-tidied, Medina and pleasant, relaxed places to stroll around in.

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Morroco, El Jadida, lady in green

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Morocco, El Jadida, Lane, lady in green

27.1 x 23.5 cm, oil on card - available

This is my last painting here. When I finished it I thought perhaps it rather naïve, but later I ae to like it because it didn`t feel as if I was the artist, that the picture was a product of another person`s instincts.

I never fell in love with El Jadida. The weather, often damp, made it less endearing, but there`s an air of dilapidation here which makes everything seem so sad.

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Jardin Jnan Sbil, Fes, Morocco, a man reading in a park

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Jardin Jnan Sbil, Fes, Morocco, a man reading

oil on card 23.8 x 30.5 cm- available

Fes

This is a lovely place. not agitated: relaxing. We are in the Ville Nouvelle, a spaciously grid of squares and apartment blocks near the station.

Fine weather with delicate sun and a temperature of about 14 degrees. I had read so much about rain and cold in Winter that we booked to stay only 4 nights. 

It would be delightful to spend three weeks here exploring patiently. There are stunning parks, palaces, ancient walls, a castle and the medina- this last, marvellous, but I confess to finding its maze of narrow lanes confusing and claustrophobic.

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El Jadida, blocks

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El Jadida: block, oil on card 24.3 x 22.3 cm - available

I find boxy architecture very enjoyable to paint when the sun is bright.

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El Jadida: Manazgan wall

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El Jadida: Mazagan, wall, oil on card 24.9 x 20.7 cm- available

Painted just outside Manazgan. 

I think such very simple compositions might reward black and white.

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Morocco: El Jadida: two paintings

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El Jadida, Mazagan, arched doorway, oil on card 25 x 21 cm - available

El Jadida, Mazagan, from the walls, oil on card 25 x 21 cm - available

El Jadida

This town is a beach town. There isn`t much to do except stroll along the beach, visit the innumerable shops selling clothes or bric a brac or sit, with dozens of black or grey clad men in the cafes- of which there are an amazing quantity- facing the street.

 Parts of the town are well kept but large sections are damp and somehow the place makes me feel a bit depressed.

Colour and Black and White

My return to colour makes me realise how much more difficult plein air painting is colour is. The range of feeling produced when you use colour is much more varied, so the final painting speaks with less singularity.

The psychological effect of colourlessness is ore profound. But my process and technique is almost the same as when I`m working in colour.

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El Jadida: street

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El Jadida: street, oil on card 27.1 x 24 cm - available

This was painted on one of those streets off Rue Abdelkader Ben Driga, a curious parallel world to the apartment bocks on Avenue Mohamed VI, much more working class and much more interesting.

 

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El Jadida: sea

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El Jadida: sea, oil on card, 27.2 x 22.2 cm, available

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El Jadida: door and windows

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El Jadida

El Jadida: Mazagan, door and windows

 21.4 x 24.5 cm, oil on card, available

This was the third place on our tour. 

It has an odd feel about it: unfinished, sometimes quite slummy at other times aspiring with new, very anonymous blocks along the seafront to the east, along with fast food joints and a cinema, all oriented towards car users. The town centre is full of shops selling bric-a-brac, cheap clothing and, not to mince words, rubbish. There are innumerable cafes which seem to be occupied by men in black or brown clothes doing very little except occasionally using their cell phones.

There are restaurants serving piles of fried seafood We ate at one and I`m not sure I`d recommend the experience. The seafood is cooked in batter like British fish and chips but had an appalling greasiness about it. The service was needlessly hurried and brusque.

Mazagan 

Mazagan is a walled enclave by the sea, with a church and other Portuguese  architecture, and tourist oriented shops and cafes. I enjoyed painting here.

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Morocco: Sidi Ifni: 3. three lighter paintings of architecture

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Sidi Ifni: three lighter paintings of architecture 

Sidi Ifni, Town centre, 29.2 x 30 cm, oil on card, available

Sidi Ifni, A view, oil on card 28.8 x 24.5, available

Sidi Ifni, A wall, gates, oil on card, 30.2 x 24.5 cm, available

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Morocco: Sidi Ifni: 2. three darker paintings

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 Sidi Ifni: three darker paintings

Sidi Ifni, Radio Antenna, blocks, oil on card, 27.2 x 23.2 cm, available

Sidi Ifni, seafront, oil on card, 27.2 x 23.2 cm, available

Sid Ifni, A block, oil on card, 21.1 x 24.9 cm, available

I continued to work in this smoky style, using a mixture of Ultramarine Blue and Burnt Umber to create a sort of black.

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Morocco: Sidi Ifni: 1. two paintings of the hills beyond

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Sidi Ifni: two paintings of the hills beyond 

Sidi Ifni, A road, oil on card, 27 x 24.5 cm, available

Sidi Ifni, View from a rise 24.5 x 20.7 cm, available

The town is every bit as lovely as I remember it: clean, quiet and friendly. 

The sea is very alive and is popular with surfers.

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Morocco: Marrakesh: two pochades

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Marrakesh

Marrakesh, motorcyclist, residential buildings, 23.5 x 28.8 cm - available

Marrakesh, a gateway,  oil on card, 18.8 x 21 cm - available

Marrakesh seemed less seedy, more touristy, less sinister and less interesting than when I was there a decade ago.

I alternated between black and white and colour across the Winter trip.

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Tangier, James McBey

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Tangier

The sweep of buildings along the water is now more more less just a series of standard issue modern structures- it is saddening to see architectural banality take over a city.

 There are still more charming places in the Medina, however, including The American Legation, which contains a good number of artworks, including works by James McBey.

There are also a set of engravings.

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Winter in Spain and Morocco- more details

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Winter in Spain and Morocco- more details

We leave in about six weeks, to visit. in sequence:

Marrakesh,

Sidi Ifni

Essaouira (probably)

El Jadida (probably)

Meknes

Tangier

Seville

Valencia

The weather here in Aberdeen has turned sharply colder, and it isn`t easy to go out comfortably.  Scotland in Winter is quite inhospitable. Moreover, the fact that I hate Christmas makes spending December in an Islamic country extremely appealing.

Northern Morocco tends to be rainy in the Winter, so we will spend most of our days in the Atlantic coast.

While in Morocco we stay in hotels, in Spain we have rented apartments. 

I`m getting boards ready: I`m thinking about continuing in black and white, at least for part of the trip.

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Winter in Spain and Morocco

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Southern Spain and Morocco

The prospect of several months of Scottish cold and darkness this winter is sufficiently unpleasant to drive me south: to Andalucia or Valencia, thence Morocco, (perhaps back to lovely Sidi Ifni, even?).

I`m thinking of adopting a new format, just for the hell of it. Perhaps something involving very simple line drawings? But the format should issue from the subject, surely? And that subject is not yet known. 

But perhaps one can make some decisions beforehand. I consider: size, weight of paper, doing monotypes, only black and white and colour (but restricted to about 6 different colours).

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