Welcome to the Addison Gallery of American Art.

I'm Tamara Vishai, host of the art history podcast, The Lonely Pallet, and throughout this three-episode series,

Your Guide to the Addison, as we celebrate its 90th anniversary by looking at some of the most

important and provocative objects in the museum's collection.

Join me on a thematic stroll through the galleries as we poke and probe both what these objects mean to art history and to each other.

Today, exploring the figure.

In my art, the Moroccan photographer Lala Asidi writes,

I wish to present myself through multiple lenses.

In short, I wish to resist stereotypes.

You've probably seen her work before.

She photographs female figures with their bodies covered in henna, a dye that temporarily pigments the skin, which is commonly used in ornate decorative patterning for celebratory events

in India, the Middle East, and Northern Africa.

The henna here is spelling out intricate, loosely rendered Arabic text,

which then extends from the body to the rest of the image,

acting like a transparent screen between the figure and us.

And this use of text as a kind of decorative veil

is particularly resonant in one of her most famous

images, Le Femme de Morocque, Le Grande Odelisk, from 2008, where she adopts the same pose

and coquettish audience-facing glance as its namesake, the famous orientalist painting,

Le Grand Odelisk, by Jean-August Dominique, Angre,

which you've also probably seen before.

And you've probably also heard of Orientalism before, but even so, here's a quick refresher.

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