The Village Photographer

May 21, 2005 8:42 AM

Au fond de l'épicerie, un trésor de Kabylie. Lost photographs, found again.
posted by TimothyMason (13 comments total)

Those are great pictures. I wish there was some text to go along with them, to explain anything about them. (Unless there was and I missed the link.)
posted by fossil_human at 9:08 AM on May 21, 2005

I'm afraid you have to buy 'Le Monde', and the text is in the weekend magazine - in French. Basically, the story is that these were taken by a village photographer, at the back of the grocery store.
posted by TimothyMason at 9:24 AM on May 21, 2005

me too fossil--wonderful pics.
posted by amberglow at 9:29 AM on May 21, 2005

Fascinating photographs. Reminds me of Disfarmer.
posted by ericb at 9:43 AM on May 21, 2005

I like how the hanging drapery theme is used to create an impression of folks at home, or something, in the grocer's studio. There's a few sets of drapes, the flooring changes. I wonder if the subjects got to chose their preferred patterns? I wonder what they thought about the whole process, especially the older ones, would they have believed years later millions would have access to their images?
posted by scheptech at 9:44 AM on May 21, 2005

Magnifique.
posted by taursir at 9:48 AM on May 21, 2005

It really wasn't that long ago that people would always go to a local studio to commemorate special events and things--sad that that's totally gone (except for Sears' kids pictures, i guess).
posted by amberglow at 10:00 AM on May 21, 2005

Here's a link with some explanation of where the photos come from - in French
posted by TimothyMason at 10:04 AM on May 21, 2005

And here are more photos from the same collection.
posted by TimothyMason at 10:05 AM on May 21, 2005

wikipedia to the rescue
posted by indices at 12:21 PM on May 21, 2005

thanks ericb for the disfarmer link...
posted by derangedlarid at 12:32 PM on May 21, 2005

Form Timothy's links: the photos were taken by Lazhar Mansouri in the village of Ain Beïda in northeastern Algeria.
posted by gubo at 1:34 PM on May 21, 2005

Thanks for the text link, Timothy. That was a beautiful summary of the author's journey to the village.
posted by fossil_human at 5:21 PM on May 21, 2005