Many frescoes and artefacts, of universal dimension, by renowned Algerian and foreign artists, constitute an artistic heritage that adorns the outdoor spaces of Algerian cities, thus highlighting their civilizational and historical depth.
Algeria has several works of art, which have become an integral part of the urban fabric and the Algerian cultural heritage, whether frescoes, sculptures or steles which adorn public places, gardens and roads, these works of art express the many artistic trends that have crossed these places, receptacles of whole sections of the history of Algeria at different times.
The fresco of the “Three Revolutions” in front of the Grande Poste in Algiers, adjacent to the “Sofia” square, designed and produced by the Algerian visual artist Chokri Mesli in 1985, restores the first stages of construction and reconstruction of sovereign Algeria in the cultural, industrial and agricultural fields.
In this work, which has become an artistic landmark of the capital, the artist has placed ceramic pieces on iron squares covered with enamel, a constellation that offers the gaze an epic scene full of movement surrounded by Amazigh shapes and symbols. found in Algerian pottery, tattoos and carpets.
Without deviating from the human tendency that is recognized for him, Chokri Mesli illuminates the dark places in people’s lives to reveal their suffering, a source of resistance and resilience to colonial oppression.
In the same vein, the statue of the “Porter” located opposite the entrance to the port of Algiers, summons the terrorist attack with the car bomb perpetrated on May 2, 1962 in this place, by the extremist organization of the army colonial secret (OAS), killing 200 Algerian port workers and other citizens, and injuring 250.
This statue, designed and produced in 1986 by the visual artist Mohamed Boukerche, presents an incredible expressive power, rendered in a material close to bronze, embodying a large man (270 cm) in motion, with a curved back and barefoot. , dressed in a turban, trousers and jacket, showing striated muscles, as he carries a load on his shoulders, no doubt, that of a mass of suffering emotions, oppression and challenge.
On the seafront in Algiers, the “Exiles” fresco (1830-1962) recalls the story of Algerians deported to distant lands in a painful image that encapsulates how colonial forces dragged Algerians in ships to La Nouvelle -Caledonia, Guyana, or even Marguerite Island.
Consecrated by the expression, “loyalty and gratitude to its sons exiled to the ends of the earth, the Algerian nation bows before their pure souls”, this historic monument was inaugurated by the President of the Republic Mr. Abdelmadjid Tebboune on July 5, 2021.
Following the example of several renowned visual artists who had animated during the 1970s a wave of artistic projects intended to embellish the urban environment, the artist-painter Taher Ouaman immortalized, in a ceramic fresco executed in 1988 on the Place Bamako in Oran, poems by Moufdi Zakaria.
Another commemorative place, rue Didouche Mourad, where a large orange disc appears on the facade of one of its buildings, supporting an Arabic calligraphy signed in 2014, by the contemporary Tunisian artist, “El seed”, at the memory of the late Algerian singer, Dahmane El Harrachi, whom he evokes through the extract of one of his poems, under the title “Bilad El Kheir”, restored in a mixture of poetry and graffiti.
In the heart of the English garden, surrounded by nature, in the Jardin d’Essai d’El Hamma, the sculptures, “Dancer of Ouled Naïl”, “Walking women holding hands”, “The flute player”, already restored , and “woman of southern Algeria”, by the French artist, native of Algiers, Emile Jean Joseph Gaudissard, receive the first rays of the sun in the middle of vegetation that highlights them.
The sculptor Ali Boukhalfa had, for his part, produced “The ear of wheat” in 2013 in the town of Hussein Dey, symbolizing the generations, of the Revolution, of Independence, and that of the Future, for continue to spread its experience and know-how in many cities, like the statue of “Emir Abdelkader” in Relizane, “La Kahina” in Khenchela and a decorative ceramic panel in the capital.
Artistic expression in open spaces has taken on a new aesthetic dimension with a wave of young designers who have embraced a modern expressive style that simulates the environment within the contemporary standards of “Street Art”.
In this surge of creativity, Makki Davas and the visual artist Amine Aïtouch, known as “Snake”, who, drawing inspiration from calligraphy, left his mark on the walls of the Casbah of Algiers, those of the city of Oran, as well as on certain sports grounds near the capital.
Some young people have also adopted graffiti to immortalize celebrities of art and culture, as well as sports personalities, or to draw large frescoes carrying artistic value and a message that often finds a connoisseur public to grasp its contents and its beauty.
