"WAH'A واحة_"
Climate change is an urgent issue that sooner or later will affect everyone on the planet; for millions of people, its consequences are already a reality. In Morocco, the oases are among the ecosystems most affected by climate change, resulting in enormous poverty, rural exodus, and deterioration of natural resources. Morocco has already lost two-thirds of its 14 million palm trees over the last century, according to official figures. As a result, the oases are now "threatened with extinction," as Greenpeace recently warned, due to the impact of high temperatures. "WAH'A واحة" is an essay that captures the consequences of climate change and exodus on the oases ecosystem in Morocco, North Africa. Through intimate documentation and coverage of local communities' lives, I intend to echo their despair in the face of the environmental and economic hardships that endanger their lands, subsistence, and heritage. Through the power of visual storytelling, I shed light on the rapid deterioration of these ecosystems and contribute to these unique environments' safeguarding efforts, with the ultimate hope that these efforts will help shape environmental and social policy. But how can one not fall into the orientalist and Eden-like image of the oasis ? How can one reproduce the reality of the deterioration of oases through images? For this reason, I wanted to explore and experiment with new processes and visual narratives to extend the metaphor of degradation. My photographic series involves external and organic elements (such as dry dates, dead skin of palm trees, soil ...) that are intimately linked to the spaces I chose to photograph. Hence, contextual layers were progressively and experimentally added to the photos, making my photographic series a work that is both documentary and conceptual, taking us back and forth between the reality of the present and the deterioration to come.












