The Youngest Inmate

Lovech_camp.jpg

Kolyo Vutev was one of the few surviving inmates of the infamous Lovech camp of the late 1950s. The last and the harshest of Bulgaria's Communist labour camps was set up near an abandoned rock quarry outside the town.

Kolyo ended up in the camp when aged 16 and still at school, he had a fight with a mate, who turned out to be the son of a member of the Communist party.

The story of Kolto Vutev is part of the MA project of Krasimira Butseva at the University of Portsmouth, Hey Balkan, you native, Ours. It studies the atrocities of the communist regime in Bulgaria between 1944 and 1989. Through the use of photography, video, archival documents and footage, the work contemplates and makes comment on the aftermath of the terror.

More of Krasimira's work on www.krasimirabutseva.co.uk