“This grain of couscous, it was the fields that their ancestors had protected and passed on, century upon century. It was the seeds that the elders learnedly studied and preserved, generation upon generation. It was the wheat that the men cultivated in the fields, season upon season. It was the semolina and the flour that the eldest women grounded on the stone mill, harvest upon harvest. It was the sun, the water, the earth, that Allah had gifted them – a present so fragile, to be cherished from the whims of an uneasy climate. It was the grain that the women rolled, shaped and steamed, dusk upon dusk. With only the sound of the couscous rolling embalming the house – kes … kes – there rose the voice of an elder, who began to sing.”
— Roxane Latrèche
Excerpt from keskes collective reading at the Villa Romana, Florence
keskes collective | Ongoing project taking communal practices around the preparation of couscous as the starting point for a vast reflection on storytelling; oral histories; History; transgenerational exchange; play; intercultural hybridity; critical post-colonial theory; processes of colonisation and decolonisation; memorial and cultural activism.
In situ research | Travels and interviews in Algeria and France
Remote research | Archives; primary and secondary sources (including fictional, secular and religious texts)
Writing | Critical essays; poetry; tales (ongoing book project)
Performative reading and talk as part of the Knowledge Sharing sessions at the Villa Romana in Florence, Italy, May 9, 2023, during a curatorial residency at AXS Art.
Reading of translated text of Omar et ses filles, from Contes et légendes arabes, Jean Corriéras, 1961
Reflection on the concept of téléphone arabe (“Chinese whispers”) and notions of play in transmission and cultural exchange
For more information, do not hesitate to get in touch directly.