Government
Demise of Les Abattoirs, a Thriving Artists’ Space in Casablanca
Artists in Morocco don’t know why an internationally recognized artists’ venue has been emptied and neglected.
CASABLANCA—At the edge of the city sits Les Abattoirs, a crumbling cathedral of art-deco architecture that served as the city’s slaughterhouse for more than a century. After the last generation of butchers left in 2002 the nearly 14-acre complex became the unlikely home of a public art movement in a city where art, fighting uphill against a lack of space, funding, and free expression, struggles to be accessible. Les Abattoirs changed that, bringing free performances, workshops, and concerts to the industrial, working-class neighborhood of Hay Mohammadi.
But now, most of those artists are gone. The gates are guarded. The warehouses are silent.