KHO

Title: KHO

Photographer(s): Romain Laurendeau

Writer(s): Romain Laurendeau

Designer(s):

Publisher(s): éditions [NO], Toulouse, France

Year: 2021

Print run: 800

Language(s): French, English

Pages: 208

Size: 22 x 27 cm

Binding: Softcover

Edition:

Print: Imprimerie Escourbiac, Paris, France

Nation(s) and year(s) of Protest: Algeria,2014-2019

ISBN: 9782957748501

Kho is a journey to the heart of the working-class districts of Algiers, to meet the young people who, one day in February 2019, broke the wall of fear by taking to the streets, giving rise to the biggest demonstrations Algeria has seen for decades.

When Romain Laurendeau discovered Algiers in 2014, Bouteflika had just been elected President of Algeria for the 4th time, a country with a very dark past that has been little documented since the ‘black decade’, the civil war of the 1990s. The photographer was immediately caught up in the general stagnation. On every street corner, huge numbers of young people seemed to be wandering aimlessly, in a void... The regime expected nothing more from them than calm and resignation.

Romain Laurendeau followed their wanderings, photographing everyday life in all its simplicity. Suspended moments that only serve to underline a singular and disturbing situation. The boredom and frustration of the street. The rage of the stadiums. The fleeting moments of freedom in discreet places, hidden from society...

He lived with these young people for over 5 years, as if inhabited by this story, which for him was more than just a documentary.