Houria, Houria wel Hoqoq ennasswiya
Houria, Houria wel Hoqoq ennaswiya (Freedom, freedom, but also the women's rights)
Series of 15 photographs and 4 panels of text (one double)
Exhibition "Algiers, archipelago of freedoms" at FRAC Centre-Val de Loire from 04.06.2021 to 02.01.2022
During the whole year of the Hirak, one of the most beautiful of my life, almost every week from the end of February 2019 to March 2020 and then from March to May 2021, I went out in Algiers (sometimes in other wilayas) to participate in the marches, shouting as close as possible to my fellow citizens our revolt against a sclerotic system based on injustice, the hoggra, chanting slogans demanding a radical, revolutionary change, a civil and not military state (doula madaniya, machi 3askariya), a free and democratic Algeria (Djazair 7ora democratiya) and also the respect of women's rights, because we knew that our feminist fight had to be at the forefront of the possibility to think a new Algeria. On Fridays, sometimes on Tuesdays during the student marches, then during some night marches especially around the electoral masquerade imposed on the people in December 2019, I always went out with my camera in order to realize a documentary photographic work from inside the movement, different from a journalistic work. I wanted to develop a situated gaze, between docu-activism, visual poetry and creative documentary.
Since March 7th 2019, the Algerian feminist movement has grown, and with several activists, we decided to march every Friday together, against the system in place and to make our feminist demands heard, inseparable in our opinion from those for social justice and democratic change carried by the Hirak. We created the feminist square in Algiers.I documented it systematically during the marches, throughout the year.
For the exhibition "Algiers, archipelago of freedoms" presented at the FRAC Centre-Val de Loire, I designed the series "Houria, Houria wel Hoqoq ennaswiya" composed of 15 color photographs showing the feminist square in Algiers at different times of the Hirak. These photographs are accompanied by 4 text panels, one of which is double, consisting of excerpts from interviews with feminist activists Sissa Iharkane and Saadia Gacem, the feminist reprise written by Amel Hadjadj inspired by La Casa d'el Mouradia and the translation of a banner by Ludmila Akkache.