Materiae Palimpsest
Overview
This book accompanies the éponymous exhibition exhibition of the Moroccan Pavilion at the 19th Venice Biennale, marking its inaugural participation. Far more than a simple presentation of the scenographic installation, it provides insights into the Pavilion's central theme: construction techniques using local materials.
Edited by LABERINTO
Contributors: El Mehdi Belyasmine, Alia Bengana, Fatima Zahra Ben Hamza, Rabia Charef, Khalil Morad El Ghilali, Philippe Garnier, Hatim Ham, Rabiaa Harrak, Mouncif Ibnoussina, Soumiya Jalal, Elie Mouyal, Ronald Rael. Nadya Rouizem, Fayçal Tiaïba.
Graphic Design: Nathalie Franck.
About the Artists
Soumiya Jalal
Soumiya Jalal is a Moroccan architect and artist whose contemporary textiles radiate with striking natural beauty. From her training as an architect, she has kept a taste for detail and a passion for technique which she uses to create her modern textures. In her work, sensation, light, and a vision of nature radiate from plant, animal, and mineral fibers. Combined, like a musical score, the creative harmonies between matter and color, density, and matte or shiny surfaces continually shift, renewing the technical challenge of handcrafting. She practices her art in Marrakech, close to the heritage she strives to preserve.
Elie Mouyal
Elie Mouyal is a Moroccan architect who graduated from the École nationale supérieure de Paris-Belleville. Upon his return to Marrakech in 1982, before even graduating, he immersed himself in the production of raw earth materials and earthen construction, supervising up to two hundred workers and masons trained directly on site. In 1986, he obtained his degree after conducting research on experimental techniques and several architectural projects. For nearly forty years, he has designed and built more than fifty buildings in the Marrakech area. His projects earned him a diverse clientele, contributing to the growth and recognition of his architectural approach, which has shaped the modern architectural identity of the city.
Fayçal Tiaïba
Fayçal Tiaïba is an architect & photographer. He holds a degree in architecture and a master’s degree in historical heritage and urban change from Sorbonne University in Paris. He has worked with Shigeru Ban in Paris on the Centre Pompidou-Metz project. In 2012, he joined Studio KO in Marrakech, for the Yves-Saint-Laurent museum project, and became a partner. He left the studio in 2022 and founded Laberinto, a multidisciplinary studio. In parallel, he continues his career as a photographer, exploring the relationship between people, architecture, society, and its historical heritage. His previous exhibitions include Gueliz Manifesto (2025) and Es Saadi: une icône marocaine (2024).
Hatim Ham
Hatim Ham is a Moroccan visual artist, interior designer, and professor. He studied interior design at the Academy of Fine Arts in Brussels, working with various well-known architecture firms, including NOUS SPRL and TERLINDEN. Passionate about photography and cinema, he also studied at the SAE Institute Technology Belgium, where he became a supervisor and teacher in production and post-production, and then the director of the Film & Animation Department. He has also trained audiovisual teams for institutions and companies, such as the European Commission, BE TV, and SWORD. While in Switzerland, he worked in advertising in Geneva and in documentary film and 3D technologies in Montreux. Hatim Ham founded OZORA PROD in Morocco, where he currently holds the position of artistic director. He has also been a lecturer at the Euromed University of Architecture and the ESDAV (School of Design and Visual Arts) advanced course, at Collège LaSalle and at ART’COM SUP in Morocco.
About the Authors
Nadya Rouizem
Nadya Rouizem Labied is a Franco-Moroccan architect, an associate lecturer at the École nationale supérieure d’architecture de Paris-Val de Seine (ENSAPVS), and a researcher at the AHTTEP (architecture histoire technique territoire patrimoine), and EVCAU (environnements numériques, cultures architecturales et urbaines) laboratories. Her book Réinventer la terre crue was published by Recherches in 2022, with the support of the CCME (Conseil de la communauté marocaine à l’étranger) and the Fondation Hassan II pour les Marocains résidant à l’étranger. It is based on her PhD research on the revival of earthen architecture in Morocco since the 1960s. Her thesis was awarded a distinction by the Academy of Architecture in Paris in 2021, and was selected for a grant in 2019 from the Caisse des Dépôts for research in architecture.
Philippe Garnier
Architect Philippe Garnier is a researcher at the AE&CC Research Unit of the Grenoble National School of Architecture (ENSAG—UGA), France. He held various positions at the CRAterre laboratory, where he has been head of the Habitats program for the last twenty years. Throughout his career, he has worked on projects related to earthen architecture and construction techniques with local and international stakeholders in twenty countries, including Morocco. His work mainly focuses on promoting local construction cultures and their diversity to mitigate disaster risks and adapt to climate change. Beyond the issues of vulnerability, he develops a resilient approach with building cultures and their reverse engineering to help meet social needs and the United Nations’ Sustainable Development Goals. He is involved in various transdisciplinary research projects (UGA Risk Institute, PEPR Science des Risques) and scientific advisory boards (AFPCNT, AFPS).
Alia Bengana
Alia Bengana is a French-Algerian architect, teacher, and author. For almost fifteen years, she has explored sustainable materials, with a focus on raw earth and natural fibers. She combines her architectural practice with teaching at the EPFL (École polytechnique fédérale) in Lausanne, the HEIA (Haute école d’ingénierie et d’architecture) in Fribourg, Switzerland, and at the EAV&T Paris-Est (École d’architecture de la ville & des territoires Paris-Est) in Champs-sur-Marne, France. She co-authored Béton, la fin d’une ère ? (Concrete, the end of an era?, Heidi.news, 2021), which was recently adapted as a graphic novel entitled Béton, enquête en sables mouvants (Presses de la Cité, 2024), an educational and entertaining book that questions our dependence on concrete and puts forward sustainable alternatives. She is a regular contributor to the French-speaking Swiss architecture magazine Tracés. In 2025–2026, she will be a resident at Villa Medici in Rome, where she will lead a project on architectural details and the simplification of construction methods, integrating proximity, natural materials, and temporality.
Fatima Zahra Ben Hamza
Fatima Zahra Ben Hamza is a Moroccan architect and visual artist based in Jeddah. Interested in contemporary urban issues, she explores social, political, and environmental realms. Since 2019, she has been part of different artistic residencies in Morocco and abroad, such as: Atelier de l’Observatoire (Morocco, Casablanca, 2019), Le Cube Independent Room (Morocco, Rabat, 2020), Andreas Zust Bibliothek (Switzerland, Alpenhof, 2021), and Albalad residency (Saudi Arabia, Jeddah, 2022). At an institutional level, since 2022, she has worked with Hafez Gallery (Jeddah) as both an artist and a space designer where she is responsible for tailor-made scenography and exhibition design for both temporary and permanent installations, collaborating with construction companies and artists.
Rabia Charef
Rabia Charef integrates circular economy principles with digitalization, rethinking construction to foster sustainability and sufficiency. An architect, researcher, and consultant, she bridges theory and practice, collaborating with designers, engineers, and policymakers. She envisions a future where waste is a resource, buildings serve as Material Banks, and sufficiency guides design choices, prioritising minimal resource use. Rabia has authored more than twenty academic papers and edited a book on circular economy. Advocating for earthen materials in sustainable construction through webinars and podcasts, she shares real-world cases. Her research promotes deconstruction, advances materials passports, and shapes European standardization, bridging academia and industry to drive systemic change for a regenerative built environment.
Rabiaa Harrak
Rabiaa Harrak is a Moroccan architect and author. An architect at the Moroccan Ministry of Culture, she has also published several works, including Mémoires du patrimoine culturel and 41 règles de gestion du patrimoine culturel, (Éditions universitaires européennes, 2024). A speaker at the International Union of Architects Forum in Malaysia in November 2024, she also represented the Moroccan Ministry of Culture in Copenhagen in 2023. A recipient of the Italian Ministry of Culture’s “International School of Cultural Heritage” program (2019–2020), she chaired the jury for the Prix Culture 2022 in Rabat. She is currently in charge of the programming department and an inspector of historical monuments.
El Mehdi Belyasmine
El Mehdi Belyasmine is a Moroccan architect and designer as well as the founder of Belyas.Co, a multidisciplinary studio dedicated to architectural innovation and human experience. His comprehensive approach treats each project as a driving force for urban and rural transformation, striving to reconcile constraints and opportunities for a positive impact on cities and communities. Based on in-depth research, his studio translates historical, social, and environmental contexts into cultural destinations. He holds a Master of Advanced Studies in architecture and digital manufacturing from ETH Zurich, Switzerland (2022) and a master’s degree in architecture from ULB La Cambre Horta in Brussels, Belgium (2015). He furthered his education with an exchange program at the School of Engineering and Architecture of Fribourg (HEIA-FR), Switzerland. His international experience brought him to Mexico, where he collaborated on cultural and urban projects with several renowned firms, including FR-EE and Estudio Lamela. He has also worked in Qatar and Morocco. He joined ACME London in 2023, spending two years helping to design mixed-use projects in the United Kingdom, China, and the UAE. He now develops projects in Africa and America through Belyas.Co, combining innovation and local involvement.
Khalil Morad El Ghilali
Khalil Morad El Ghilali is a Moroccan architect and teacher at the National School of Architecture (ENA) in Marrakech. He is also a PhD student in architecture at the Euromed University of Fes and a guest lecturer at “Escape Lab” at the University of Thessaly in Greece. After extensive experience in several architectural firms, he started his own studio in 2019, Atelier BE (ateliers Bâtis Écoresponsables), in Rabat. This interdisciplinary design and research firm uses a diverse range of approaches and perspectives to explore themes such as climate change, ecology, human perception, the impact of emerging technologies, and their potential to transform our current way of life through imminent fictions. By using climate change scenarios as a vehicle, various ecological speculations are put forward, challenging current economically viable models. Atelier BE’s young team of artisans, architects, urban planners, and landscape architects has a wealth of experience, which allows them to quickly and effectively address a variety of climate-related issues across the Kingdom of Morocco.
Mounsif Ibnoussina
Mounsif Ibnoussina is a Moroccan professor and researcher affiliated with the Semlalia Faculty of Science of the Cadi Ayyad University in Marrakech. A specialist in Mediterranean architectural heritage, his field of study focuses on construction materials, particularly rammed earth, clay mineralogy, and geotechnical risk assessment. Ibnoussina holds several PhDs and has headed research laboratories and held key positions within his institution, while publishing numerous academic articles. Founder of the Rencontres internationales sur le patrimoine architectural de la Méditerranée (RIPAM) and president of the RIPAM Network, he has organized several international symposia. Alongside his research, he has taught and mentored students in Morocco and abroad, organizing workshops on ecological materials and heritage conservation. He is involved in scientific collaborations with European institutions and has been the president of the Association Labina, dedicated to sustainable architecture, since 2017.
Technical Details
- Publication Date:
- Wednesday, May 7, 2025
- Language:
- English
- Format:
- Hardcover
- Dimensions:
- 24 x 18 cm
- Weight:
- 0.5 kg
- ISBN:
- 978-614-8035-73-9
- Number of Pages:
- 144
- Publisher:
- Kaph Books
- Categories:
- Architecture