Bab El Fenn: books to step into art… and come out an artist!
Bab El Fenn, “the door to art,” brings children into a work of art through fiction. Each album first tells an adventure, a tale, or a riddle that can be read and loved without knowing anything about Moroccan art. Then, often without warning, the hero slips into a riad, a madrasa courtyard, a painting, or a sculpture. The artwork is never a teaching pretext: it is a setting, and sometimes even a character. Emotion comes first, knowledge follows.
For children aged 4 and up, and for parents and teachers who want to explore art together.
They learn to look closely, to recognize the works of Moroccan artists, to understand Moroccan art in all its complexity, and to feel confident creating their own. At the end of each album, a 2-4 page documentary section presents a reproduction of the real artwork, its historical context, and a mini-glossary.
Illustrated fiction albums (adventures, tales, riddles), each followed by its documentary section. The albums are published in French, Arabic, and English.
Each album is a meeting of four players: the author of the text, the illustrator, the Moroccan artist or tradition that inspired the story, and above all the child, the true main character, who doesn’t just read but steps into the story, lives it, and makes it their own.
Each album invites children to step outside the book: to see the sculpture in its square, to touch the zellige wall of the madrasa, to hear the guembri resonate in the medina. The artwork becomes a lived experience, not just an image on a page. Push open the door and discover the albums.
