Baya Mahieddine or Baya, also known as Fatma Haddad, is an Algerian artist introduced in Paris in the 1940s after her first solo exhibition in 1947 at the Maeght Gallery. Described by Andr\u00e9 Breton as a \u201cqueen\u201d, and included to the repertoire of Art Brut by Jean Dubuffet, Baya seems to have left her mark on the Parisian art scene of the second half of the 20th century.<\/p>\n
Her work follows a very intuitive path: the colourful gouaches, populated with flowers, animals and especially female figures, are inspired by her adoptive mother\u2019s work and the atmosphere she grew up in. She started painting instruments after she married a musician in 1961, and she took further her love for \u201cmaking soil\u201d in 1948 at a pottery workshop in Vauliers, a year after being introduced in Paris.<\/p>\n
Recent research has revealed more layers to her work. First, its part in the construction of artistic modernism in Paris, which is difficult to measure for artists of the MENA region. Secondly, the omnipresence of the female figure in her gouaches appealing for a closer look at her status as a woman artist. These two readings will be presented here as they offer an overview on Baya\u2019s impact as an Algerian woman artist of her time.<\/p>\n
Born in Algiers in 1931, Baya was brought up by her grandmother, whom she helped with her work on a colonial horticultural farm. The farm owner\u2019s sister, Marguerite Camina Benhoura, who was also a painter, integrated Baya into the domestic chores and took a liking to the child, whom she eventually adopted in 1942. Baya grew up between Marguerite\u2019s houses in Algiers and South of France, where she was imbued with the visual atmosphere of flowers and birds which inhabits her gouaches, but also in her adoptive mother\u2019s paintings and her collection, including some Braque and Matisse. Marguerite Benhoura received Aim\u00e9 Maeght in Algiers in 1943 and the gallery owner got interested in Baya\u2019s productions. An exhibition was then devoted to the young artist in 1947 in his gallery in Paris which quite defined her\u00a0status among the artistic scene of the time.<\/p>\n