Dualité

Two 113X58cm 87x37cm  oil on cloth, by Youssef El Khorib 

The art work explores figures of duality as two figures appear more like emotional presences across different backgrounds. Their elongated faces, simplified bodies, and oversized hands create a language that is instinctive rather than realistic, giving the painting a raw immediacy. They appear connected yet distant. The bold outlines and flattened colors recall a folk or symbolic visual language, where expression comes through gesture and contrast rather than detail. Reds, greens, ochres and deep blues vibrate against the pale background, allowing the figures to emerge with a quiet intensity. The asymmetry of the eyes and features gives them a fragile humanity.  The artist's sense of innocence is present in his brushwork — direct, unpolished and emotionally open as if the painting values feeling over perfection. The result is both playful and unsettling, balancing tenderness with estrangement, presence with distortion.

About the Artist: Youssef El Khorib is a self taught artist born in1963 in Morocco. His artwork is a personal expression of apprehending the everyday life far from the usual mundane. His universe is a perpetual swing between dream and reality. Working with a vibrant palette and recurring motifs, his paintings are animated by bold, expressive brushwork. Faces, signs, minarets, rowboats, and donkeys appear throughout his work, woven into lively and richly textured compositions. Although his work typically includes signs, minarets, rowboats and donkeys to resemble the Mediterranean, the artwork selected here present a different line.