Biography:

Born 1964 in Marietta, Ohio, Almasude grew up on a farm in South Eastern Ohio. Almasude studied art at Marietta College from 1982 to 1984, then at Ohio University's School of Fine Arts from 1984 to 1986. She traveled to London England to study art in 1986. Soon after graduating from Ohio University in 1993 with a Masters of Fine Arts in Painting, Almasude traveled to Morocco with her husband Amar (originally from Nador, Morocco).

She worked with her husband on projects dealing with the language of the indigenous people on North Africa, including the creation of a computer program that brought the formally unwritten language of Tamazight to print. She traveled extensively in Morocco and researched the culture, politics and condition of the Moroccan people. While in Morocco she began her current series about the people of Morocco. The Almasude family settled in 1996 in Florence South, Carolina, where they still reside.

Painter, JoAnna Pettit-Almasude's current work offers a poignant record of the traditional culture as well as the major changes of the North African Country of Morocco in the late twentieth century. Although Almasude's work is culturally specific, she is primarily concerned with expressive portrayals of the human condition. She sees the changing position of the Moroccan people as universally experienced by all countries and peoples. This changing position, Almasude sees as including the invasion of Western Modernity, the question of the position of women in general, and the "MOTHER" specifically in modern life.

Almasude has incorporated images of her Moroccan family into many of her works; "The Foreigner" ink on paper, 1995 - depicts Almasude ironically as the foreigner in Morocco. Almasude depicts herself out of place, (wearing "western" clothes, sleeveless, no head covering) she is seated on a salon couch with her Husband Amar and Amar's mother in traditional Moroccan dress, with classic Moroccan tile in the background. Though this work as surface level appears to be a simple portrait, on further inspection viewers can discover that in Morocco the marriage to the "foreigner" is becoming a more typical scenario for the "modern" Moroccan family. Though a practice still somewhat frowned upon; due to massive immigration to Europe, especially Germany for employment, Moroccan families are experiencing at least one family member marrying the "foreigner." "Mother's Tears" ink on paper, 1995, is a political work in which Almasude depicts the traditional "Mother figure" looking upon the the strife between the government and the indigenous people about the question of the native language Tamazight. Tamazight was until recently an unwritten language spoken by up to 60% of Moroccan's. However at best Tamazight was unrecognized by the Moroccan government, at worst professionals such as professors, singers and political activists have been arrested, tortured and executed for advocating the inclusion of Tamazight into schools, and basic governmental recognition of this, for many their only spoken language.