He grew up in the area of the Aurès Mountains, and attended the École régionale des beaux-arts [fr] in Batna.

[1][2] Between 1994 and 1999, Abdessemed attended the École nationale supérieure des beaux-arts in Lyon, in eastern central France.

[4] Abdessemed's life-size sculptural variations of iconic images, such as the nine-year-old Phan Thị Kim Phúc (nicknamed 'the Napalm Girl') running away naked from an explosion throughout the Vietnam War in 1972 or the French football player Zinedine Zidane headbutting Marco Materazzi during the 2006 FIFA World Cup Final (Headbutt) are only two examples of how the immediacy of such moments take on fresh meaning when solidified in a form designed to make them still and everlasting.

And even in those moments when the relationship between subject and rendition is a bit more fluid, as for example with the combination of the Antonio Canova-inspired sculpture group Is Beautiful with the terracotta-made, hard working men depicted in Sham, the outcome does not seem to change.

This is not a literal representation of reality, but rather a sublimation of iconic images to art that takes place.