Informed by post-independence avant-gardes and the vernacular traditions of her native Morocco, Khalili’s artistic approach combine performative strategies of storytelling, reactivating the civil poetry as defined by Italian poet and filmmaker Pier Paolo Pasolini and inspired by the old tradition of Moroccan Al-Halqa. As a political voice endorsing the collective one from the singular experience, Pasolini’s civic poet mirrors the Moroccan Halqa, the country’s most ancient form of public storytelling.

Mixing up popular tales, ancient poems and political references the Al-Halqa performer subverts official historiographies and narratives to eventually become at once the people’s living archives and its public voice. Operating similarly, Khalili’s work develops civic platforms for first person accounts eventually forming collective stories of resistance.