In 2012, when I painted
the minaret of Jara Mosque in my hometown of Gabes, in the south of Tunisia,
I never thought that a graffiti would bring so much attention to a city.
At the beginning, I was just looking for a wall in my hometown,
and it happened that the minaret was built in '94,
and for 18 years, those 57 meters of concrete stayed grey.
When I met the imam for the first time, and I told him what I wanted to do,
he was like, "Thank God you finally came,"
and he told me that for years he was waiting for somebody
to do something on it.
The most amazing thing about this imam is that he didn't ask me anything,
neither a sketch or what I was going to write.
In every work that I create, I write messages
with my style of calligraphy,
a mix of calligraphy and graffiti.
I use quotes or poetry.
For the minaret, I thought that the most relevant message
to be put on a mosque should come from the Quran,
so I picked this verse:
"Oh humankind, we have created you from the male and the female,
and made you people and tribe so you may know each other."
It was a universal call for peace, tolerance, and acceptance
coming from the side that we don't usually portray in a good way in the media.
I was amazed to see how the local community reacted to the painting,
and how it made them proud to see the minaret
getting so much attention
from international press all around the world.
For the imam, it was not just a painting. It was really deeper than that.
He hoped that this minaret would become a monument for the city
and attract people to this forgotten place of Tunisia.
The universality of the message,
the political context of Tunisia at this time,
and the fact that I was writing Quran in a graffiti way
were not insignificant.
It reunited the community.
Bringing people, future generations, together through Arabic calligraphy
is what I do.
Writing message is the essence of my artwork.
What is funny actually is that even Arabic-speaking people
really need to focus a lot to decipher what I'm writing.
You don't need to know the meaning to feel the piece.
I think that Arabic script touches your soul before it reaches your eyes.
There is a beauty in it that you don't need to translate.
Arabic script speaks to anyone, I believe:
to you, to you, to you, to anybody,
and then when you get the meaning, you feel connected to it.
I always make sure to write messages
that are relevant the place where I'm printing,
but messages that have a universal dimension,
so anybody around the world can connect to it.
I was born and raised in France, in Paris,
and I started learning how to write and read Arabic when I was 18.
Today I only write messages in Arabic.
One of the reasons this is so important to me
is because of all the reaction I've experienced all around the world.
In Rio de Janeiro, I translated this Portuguese poem
from Gabriela Tôrres Barbosa,
who was giving an homage to the poor people of the favela,
and then I printed it on the rooftop.
The local community were really intrigued by what I was doing,
but as soon as I give them the meaning of the calligraphy,
they thanked me, as they felt connected to the piece.
In South Africa, in Cape Town,
the local community of Philippi