"LES ENDORMIS" ("The Sleepers") by Nejma Bourouaha

Nejma Bourouaha's first solo exhibition, ‘Les endormis’, is a gallery of animal portraits, all plunged into a deep sleep. Everyone is asleep, immersed in the fabulous world of dreams and daydreams.

Moles, hedgehogs, squirrels, foxes, geese, donkeys, rabbits, otters, ducks... sleep, alone or with their families, sometimes in unlikely pairs, like this cat and this duck embracing, being different doesn't prevent them from trusting each other, until they fall asleep together.

Each drawing is painted in gouache with incredible meticulousness, fine, precise, light strokes accumulating and superimposing themselves to create the silkiness of a fur, the velvet of an anemone, or sublimely refined motifs. But beyond her virtuoso technique, which is now her signature, there is above all an incredible gentleness and tenderness, infinitely comforting.

Nejma's compositions are a treasure trove of fantasy and poetry. The marvellous is in the details, the rabbit's footprints on its snow blanket, the duck's webbed slippers carefully arranged at the foot of the bed, two little otters sleeping in the infinity of a lake in the colours of the night, with a bedside lamp still lit and gently drifting...

Nejma's world is not confined to that of children, even if they are very lucky that these drawings also exist for them.