Jean Besancenot, (; 24 September 1902 – 27 July 1992), born Jean Girard, was a French painter, documentary photographer, and self-trained ethnographer, active mainly during the 1930s and 1940s in the French protectorate in Morocco.
He is mainly known for his illustrated book Costumes du Maroc with ethnographic information and portrait paintings of Moroccans in traditional costumes and other personal adornment, published first in French in 1942. The first ethnographic information on Moroccan fashion, it has been called an "iconic" work of lasting influence on traditional Moroccan garments and how they were worn. Besides several editions in French, an English translation, Costumes of Morocco, was published in 1990. By 1953, when he published his second major work about select pieces of jewellery in Morocco, Bijoux arabes et berbères du Maroc, he had become Head of the Iconographic Service of the Moroccan Office of Information.This official function is mentioned on the title page of Bijoux arabes et berbères du Maroc: 40 planches comprenant 193 modèles de bijoux, dessinés et commentés. Casablanca: Ed. de la Cigogne, 1953. New edition Casablanca: Éditions Frontispice, 2001,
His work, composed of detailed descriptions, numerous black-and-white photographs, films, drawings and paintings, testifies to the history and aesthetics of Moroccan cultural heritage of the 1930s and 1940s, still little marked by Western influences. Because of ongoing reproductions and alterations in publications, by art galleries and fashion designers, his photos and paintings have been called "a form of public domain media for 'traditional' Moroccan dress".Nicholas (2014), p. 401
Biography
Besancenot was born as Jean Girard on 24 September 1902 in Estrées-Saint-Denis of northern France. After his studies at the École des Arts Décoratifs in Paris, he started his career as a painter with an interest in French regional folk costumes.
Commissioned by the administration of the French protectorate in Morocco, he collected ethnographic observations and records of traditional dress and lifestyles during his extensive travels in this country on three visits between 1934 and 1939, as well as during a longer stay between 1940 and 1945. In a small Ford automobile, he journeyed to remote parts of the country, travelling by donkey back in the more remote regions. Although having been warned about the general and gender-specific difficulties of approaching Moroccan people and studying the dress and jewellery of women as a foreigner, his obvious success was attributed to his friendly and sensitive approach. On some of his trips, he was accompanied by his wife, which made access to the world of women easier. At times he managed to gain the support of a communal leader (caïd), who allowed him to take pictures of his wife and children dressed in the traditional way. During his prolonged stay in the medina of Salé between 1940 and 1943, he established close relations with Jewish families in the mellah (Jewish quarter) whose daughters agreed to pose in traditional dress.
In 1945, Besancenot undertook a field trip to the southwestern regions, where he felt like one of the first Frenchmen ever to have visited these regions. During his visits in the Tafilalet, the valleys of the Draa, Dadès and Todgha, in the Anti-Atlas and the Sous region, he completed his earlier studies and took additional notes and photographs. Some of his travel was in remote Jewish Berber communities, which prompted his remark about the small town of Tissint: "I had in front of me a group of human beings who were leading exactly the same kind of life as their ancestors 2000 years ago."
Ethnographic and artistic works
Besancenot first became known for his artistic illustrations and detailed descriptions of traditional folk costumes and other forms of personal adornment, including the jewellery of the Berber cultures in Morocco. Costumes du Maroc, 1943 and Bijoux arabes et berbères du Maroc, 1953
Costumes et types du Maroc (1942)
For his illustrated book Costumes du Maroc (1942), he identified three basic categories of costumes: rural Berber dress, Jewish dress and urban citizens' costumes, some of which showing influences from Arab culture.Alaoui, Rachida (2003) Costumes et parures du Maroc, p. 8-9: "The urban costume draws its origins from the Arab-Muslim cultural aesthetics that developed under the Moroccan dynasties since the 8th century. The political union between the Maghreb and al-Andalus favored intense exchanges between the two shores of the Mediterranean. The resulting symbiosis was at the origin of a refined style known as Hispano-Moorish art. [...] Under the reign of Sultan Moulay Ismael (c. 1645-1727) fabrics made in France, Holland or Italy were imported, and Spanish and Italian Renaissance motifs entered into the textile production of Azemmour, as did influences from the Balkan in certain embroideries of Fez." Moreover, each of the portraits of his 60 gouache paintings was attributed to a specific social role (married woman, palace guard, musician etc.), city or region, and Berber dress also assigned to corresponding tribal groups. His artistic portraits on a white background show more women than men (43 and 17 respectively), most of them in elaborate dress that the author found "the most beautiful or at least most representative".
As these forms of dress were still very much current and differentiated in the 1930s, Besancenot remarked that in rural areas, each type of dress represented a tribal identity. Commenting on the different forms of Moroccan dress, he drew special emphasis to the draped garments, especially common in rural communities, and to the more urban traditions of the so-called Arab dress of Moorish and Near Eastern origin. In more than 100 detailed comments on the different kinds of dress, he observed that urban people differ very clearly by their costume from the rural populations. Even so, he observed some fundamental pieces of clothing like the djellaba and the burnous in both groups. In all instances, he saw a different appearance according to the changing quality of the fabrics, as well as in the ways the same kind of garment was worn. He noted further that "the Moroccan excels in communicating extremely varied expressions by his dress. The art of wearing it plays an important role here."
With regard to the two groups of Moroccan Jews, he presented Jewish brides of Rabat and Fes in their ceremonial dress, as well as an urban gentleman, all representative of the Sephardic communities. The other group of Jewish Moroccans, who had lived in the country since ancient times and were part of the Berber population, was represented by ornately dressed women and a boy of the southern regions.The juxtaposition of his photographs and the resulting paintings in Assouline and Carré (2020) shows the documentary image of the actual persons and Besancenot's artistic rendering for his book. See pp. 72/73 and 76/77
Besancenot's artistic full size colour portraits could not render sufficient detail of hair styles, shoes or how to drape loose pieces of textiles, like the urban haik or Berber draped garments. To provide more information, he added explanations and drawings of such elements of dress on separate pages. In detailed drawings, he further described 56 pieces of urban as well as 38 of rural Berber pieces of women's jewellery.
The first edition of Costumes du Maroc was published in 1943 as a special edition of 300 copies with separate facsimile prints of the 60 costumes. Sultan Mohamed V, who opposed the anti-Jewish policy of the Vichy regime in MoroccoSusan Gilson Miller (2013). A History of Modern Morocco, pp. 142-143. and later became the first king of Morocco, was one of the first subscribers. A reprint of 350 copies was only produced four years before the author's death in 1988, and an enlarged second edition followed in 2008.Jean Besancenot. Costumes du Maroc. Second, revised and enlarged edition. Aix-en-Provence: Edisud 2008.
Bijoux arabes et berbères du Maroc (1953) In his second major ethnographic work, titled Bijoux arabes et berbères du Maroc, Besancenot published his drawings and descriptions of almost 200 different pieces of so-called Arab and Berber jewellery from various places and traditions in Morocco. Thanks to his artistic training as painter, his drawings highlight the intricate features of the pieces in reduced detail compared to his corresponding photographs.
In the introduction to his drawings and explanations, he commented on the origins, social use and meaning of jewellery for the different communities, as well as on the changing tastes of the customers during the first half of the 20th century. With reference to the origins of Berber jewellery, he presumed influences of ancient Mediterranean traditions as well as of the caravan routes crossing the Sahara and of historical Roman and Carthaginian styles in the Maghreb. While he considered Near Eastern Arab jewellery of little influence, he stressed the importance of the medieval art of Al-Andalus on urban as well as rural (Berber) styles of jewellery. Referring to the respective clients and their tastes, he stated the general rule: Urban jewellery was usually made of gold and other adornments, and pieces for rural Berber clients were almost exclusively made of silver, both with many local variations in shape, usage and attachments of other elements. As jewellery has been an important part of a woman's dowry in the Maghreb, he further observed:
In contrast to these urban traditions, Besancenot acknowledged the harsh living conditions of rural women, marked by all kinds of domestic chores like fetching water, grinding cereals, preparing food etc. He observed their similar taste for elaborate and often heavy silver jewellery. To hold simple sheets of cloth together as a draped garment, for example, the characteristic fibula brooches were a necessity, and women often wore their full set of jewellery during their daily activities. He also observed that the adornment consisted of a set of jewellery that was in principle exactly the same for each woman of a given tribal group. This uniformity began to change from the beginning of the 20th century, when these jewels still constituted "a tribal mark as certain as the women's tattoos or the patterns of the woollen blankets worn on their shoulders". Apart from weddings and other crucial events in a family's life, important occasions for women to dress in their best jewellery, make-up, hairstyle and clothes were social events like the communal dances (ahidus and ahwash).
With regard to the cultural meaning of different pieces of jewellery, Besancenot claimed that the basic forms and their decoration originally expressed symbolic messages. Even if such original messages had been lost over time, there were forms whose particular value remained well known to all members of the community. As a case in point, he referred to the same beliefs of Muslim as well as Jewish Berber women that it was necessary to protect oneself from the powers of evil, to ward off bad luck and to avail oneself of beneficial influences through jewellery worn as amulets. Moreover, in rural areas as well as in the cities, Besancenot had observed Moroccans believing in superstition and black magic.
Referring to interpretations of Berber motifs as archetypal forms with protective features that have been traced to pre-Islamic times by colonial-era ethnologists such as Gabriel Camps,Gabriel Camps (1995) Les Berbères: mémoire et identité. Paris: Errances, p. 210 art historian Cynthia Becker cautioned that the notion of an "unconscious, millennia-old “Berberness” fails "to consider the subtle social encounters and negotiations that influence artistic production."