Moroccan photographers

For much of its history Morocco was photographed by visitors who came for the light, the souks and the "exotic", and Moroccan photographers have spent decades answering those images. Mohamed Maradji, who began as a street photographer in Casablanca in the 1950s, recorded the monarchy and public life of independent Morocco for more than sixty years. Daoud Aoulad-Syad photographed rural Morocco before turning to film.

A later generation, many of them living between Morocco and Europe, reframed the country's image: Leila Alaoui's life-size portraits in Les Marocains, Hassan Hajjaj's bright pop-art portraits of Marrakech, Lalla Essaydi's calligraphy-covered women, and Yto Barrada's work on Tangier and the Strait of Gibraltar. These are Morocco's photographers, most looked-up first. For more, read African photography and our guide to North Africa.