Le Sacre, 2024 by Moroccan multidisciplinary visual artist Safae El Kadi is an exploration of “tension between material and surface, between action and trace, between cause and consequence.” It is created on a stainless-steel wire mesh, in order to allow the material to mold itself through and around it. El Kadi uses self-hardening paste, a deliberate choice since it is similar to modeling clay, a material often used by children when they first start creating things. This connection highlights how the artwork is about shaping and changing—both physically and personally.

For the artist, this piece is “a landscape in perpetual unfolding, a scene in constant mutation.” In the middle are two childlike figures with unusual and bright colored hair, which immediately draws the attention and positions them at the center of the unfolding narrative. The human silhouettes surrounding them stand in judgement and observation. The lack of facial features is deliberate, as these figures bear witness or perhaps watch an “initiatory rite”. A transformation is underway, whereby “the overall scene evokes a rite of passage, a silent ceremony where childhood is exposed to the gaze of the adult world.”