Formed at the Haute École des Arts du Rhin (HEAR, 2015), Ouissem Moalla (born in 1990 in Stockholm) explores themes of space and memory in his work, drawing inspiration from the research of historian Frances A. Yates. He draws from popular and literary culture, myths, and major texts, with language as a recurring thread. This takes shape through performances, installations, and paintings in which he questions space, our relationship to places, cosmogony, and beliefs.

Whether in Mulhouse, where his studio is located, or during residencies (Motoco&co Tokyo 2018; CEEAC - Basis E.v. Frankfurt 2023; Villa Salammbô Institut français Tunisia 2024), he works with the remnants of industrial ruins (G.O.L.D, 2017), explores myths and representations of urban gateways (Impressions d’Espaces, 2024), wanders around a Shinto shrine carrying chairs strapped to his back to form the character 目 (mù / eye) (Monkey, 2018), or reinterprets mystical texts by intertwining language and the body (Clavis Tabula, 2023). His work, enriched by multicultural influences, flirts with the human and social sciences, questioning archives and communities.

Ouissem Moalla classifies his works into «series», each forming a universe that he continuously expands with new projects exploring the same themes.

DOORS 2022-25

A reasearch about doors and gates as social and symbolic constructs.

Doors is a research project through which I explore the door as a social object, examining its material and symbolic dimensions. Ambivalent by nature, it stands in contrast to the walls that surround it, offering the possibility of passage while remaining an obstacle. It embodies both security and vulnerability. Historically, it has played a role in the founding myths of cities as well as in their downfall. It is also a factor of exclusion, desire, and fetishization. Doors serve as monuments of triumph for the powerful and as passageways for the gods.

In fiction, they become portals to other worlds, other realities, and other temporalities, reinforcing their role as gateways beyond the tangible. In urban spaces, they mark property, define a place of transition and waiting, and serve as thresholds where people sit and observe the world. Used at various scales—architecture, cities, nations, and even continents—they form a recurring element in contemporary political discourse. As threshold markers, they reveal structural, even primal, patterns of thought.