Mohamed Babahoum was born about thirty kilometers from Essaouira, a port on the Atlantic Ocean, in a village surrounded by argan trees. As an adult, he left the agricultural work of his village and moved closer to Essaouira, becoming a scrap metal dealer and second-hand goods trader, supplying souk merchants with whatever he could collect. Later, he operated an olive press powered by a dromedary.
As old age approached, almost by chance or out of idleness, he began to draw—casually, without much conviction. One day at the souk, he showed his drawings to a friend: “My nephew made these,” he said. Over time, he grew more confident and eventually claimed the work for himself: “I made them. Would you like more?”
Initially, he drew with a ballpoint pen on the backs of used sheets of paper or on the blank reverse sides of instruction leaflets. Later, he moved on to thicker cardboard packaging, outlining his figures boldly with a black felt-tip pen.
His imaginary world is richly populated: donkeys, oases, ducks, wells, souks, carpets, palm trees, and ramparts; goats perch in trees, and old men wave their canes toward the sky.
In 2014, Babahoum was hospitalized with pneumonia, an event after which he remained silent for a long period. He now lives with his son. Despite age, fatigue, and illness, he has never ceased to paint and draw.