ABSTRACT
Beginning with a piece that the author painted in Casablanca in 1990, the author explore the connections between art and anthropological invention, the ethnographic process and artistic/authorial authority. Since the early 1990s, visual anthropology has helped anthropologists to develop a keener eye. The people have become increasingly sophisticated in analysing visual arts and aesthetic practices around the world. In the Chaouen triptych, tables and tabliers and mosaic puzzles are combined, but in a way that directs the viewers gaze much more firmly than in the mosaics. The Chaouen painting played a role in elaborating a kind of ‘strong position’ as an ethically and practical necessary part of the research process. A sketch or painting can be rather like a field note – it can focus attention on certain objects, regularities or connections. Art becomes a method of working out and working with others in ways that can include those who cannot read, or cannot understand her academic language.
