The words of the poems written by the Artist are the curtains which are digitally printed on the photos. It is a kind of positive ritual that comes from a deep desire to renew with the past and to build up new ties. Those words, expressed in three languages (French, English and Arabic), represent the multi-culture but also the intensive need to communicate with the homeland that is changing so much. The family photos taken by the artist during her visits to Algeria, are the witnesses of her observation: the words are the silent commentaries on the events and changes that took place during her thirty years of immigration.

' When we look at Houria Niati magnificent and exhilarating "Rideaux de Mots" (Curtains of Words), we could think that they are basically about an effort of memory devoted to the recovery of the artist's origins, which she is inviting the viewer to witness and to participate in. They may be so, but it is not perhaps that simple. What actually are we seeing? Contrary to the title of the work, these are not words which are instantly nor easily identifiable and legible, but primarily a calligraphic tracery, threads of colour, a colourful tapestry on a photographic background.

If we recognise a script, or rather scripts consisting of characters, styles and sizes, all very different of each other, we are aware of their visual presence rather than meaning, as is often the case with painters; their appearance and delicate structure initially create a barrier and prevent us from deciphering and "reading" them.

Through this "curtains of words" (well named since the words appear as objects, simultaneously veil and threshold as a tracery of text) we see amateur photos, the artist's family snapshots, the most of the time women, her relations and herself at different periods of their lives with its double contrast of writing styles and figures, the brilliant and clear-cut colour of the words and the more discrete, greyer colours of the photograph, the composition can be read as a passage from the present to the past and a return to the native land of the artist.'

Extract from Calli-Photograph, text written in French by Patrick Vauday, translated by Isobel Alsbury Artist Painter.