THE ISLAMIC WATER GARDEN
Jardin Majorelle Marrakesh, Morocco
Although the Islamic garden appears, at first sight, to be highly formulaic — high- walled and private, bisected by two canals or rills and with four rectangular beds — the work of the French painter Jacques Majorelle (1886-1962) in Marrakesh proves how adaptable even this format can be.
Majorelle was a great traveller in Africa before he arrived in Morocco, where he decided to stay because of his health. He chose to make his home in the beautiful town of Marrakesh, with its clear light and color and backdrop of the snow-tipped Atlas Mountains, and he settled at the edge of the town in 1919. Morocco was then still a French colony, and much of the architecture outside the souk and dramatic main square is recognizably French.
The artist, having moved into his pavilion villa with adjoining studio, started to experiment with his walled garden. The garden was already constructed along classic Islamic lines, with its crossing rills, fountains and a large fish tank, and as the garden was built on a sloping site, there were constant changes in level as the main path wound its way through the flower beds. However, it was only in the 1930s that the garden began to take on its distinctive character.
Opposite Although this is clearly a Mughal garden, it is far more playful than most, and, rather than being enclosed, the views down the main cascade open up on to the lake itself.
Top left The magnificent mountains provide a breathtaking backdrop. Above and top right Nishat Bagh is hugely admired — the jewel in Kashmir's crown — and is enjoyed for its frivolity and liveliness, which are more apparent than in most Mughal gardens. is shaded by a double row of chinar trees (Platanus orientalis). At the top of the garden is a pleasure pavilion.
A delightful Mughal painting in a book of poems of 1663 by Zafar Khan, a governor of Kashmir, depicts a very grand personage (perhaps Asaf Khan himself?) sitting on a golden oriental carpet with his courtiers around him and Nishat Bagh behind. A steep cascade is shown with a pavilion at the top, and on either side of the rushing water are beds of poppies and irises. In the background is a range of fierce mountains. Another part of the painting shows a series of arched niches built behind the cascade, probably intended for lights. The Mughals apparently made their waterfalls and fountains even more dramatic by putting lamps behind the water to increase the sparkle. These can still be seen at the seventeenth-century garden of Rambagh at Agra.
The garden also has a zenana. a special area for women, where two octagonal, three-storey gazebos were built so that ladies could view the lake, the rice paddies and the mountains beyond. There are also special viewing platforms alongside the rushing water.
The Garden Book (z000) is full of praise for this gem of a water garden: As the garden has a far steeper ascent than any other Mughal garden, the features have a more dramatic and lively effect: the water cascades faster, the sizes of the chutes are greater. This garden is much louder and visually ostentatious — a radical move away from the subtle and sublime tranquility of most other Mughal garden settings. The site is superb — and a crowning jewel of the Kashmir.'
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