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Abdoulaye Konate (1953-)

Seydou Keita (1921-2001)

Malick Sidibe (1935-2016)

Global Contemporary: Mali Focus on three artists

Konate Hommage aux chasseurs du Mandé

1994 (Tribute to Mande hunters)

Konate did at least two of these large wall hangings between 1994 and 1996

See Youtube video on Blackboard

Konate Hommage aux chasseurs du Mandé, 1996

(Tribute to Mande hunters)

Remember this guy? Asante

warrior in a war gown covered

with amulets

from Guimba the Tyrant trailer Costume design by Groupe Bogolan Kasobane

A gathering of hunters in Bamako

hunters

Konate Gris Gris Blancs, 2005

(White amulets)

Mande hunter’s shirt, Indianapolis Museum of Art

Abdoulaye Konate, Bleu no. 1, 2014, H. 92 1/8 inches x 12 ft 11 1/4 inches Abdoulaye Konaté’s monumental fabric-based works breathe fresh life into West Africa’s rich and dynamic textile traditions. Drawing upon textiles as his primary medium, Konaté composes abstract and figurative tableaux. Bleu no. 1 is part of a recent series of labor-intensive assemblages of delicately cut and sewn layered fringes of different lengths presented in a solo exhibition at the 2014 Dakar Biennale. In this intensive exploration of the spectrum of blue tones, Konaté pays tribute to the indigo dye that has been so central to West African aesthetics.

Met Museum

Symphony in Color Konate exhibition in

London, 2016

Abdoulaye Konaté’s textile installation titled, Hommage à Youssouf Tata Cissé et Germaine Dieterlen will be on show in Zeitz MOCAA’s BMW Atrium until 11 January 2021. (Cape Town South Africa)

Alphonse-Eugene-Jules Itier Travelers on a sailing boat on the Nile, daguerreotype, 1845/46

Photography invented in 1839 with the announcement in France of the process for making daguerreotypes.

Within months, the first daguerreotype was taken on the African continent

Seydou Keita (1921-2001)

Sometimes described as the “Father” of African Photography. Not so:

Photography as a medium arrived in Africa almost immediately after it was

invented in Europe around the mid-19th century, for a century before

Keita opened his practice, including both European and African

photographers.

Untitled (Self-Portrait), 1959

Keita became interested in photography when his uncle gave him a Kodak Brownie camera. He opened a commercial photo studio in Bamako around 1948 and became known for

his portraits until about 1964.

Photography in Africa: Issues of Authorship and Authenticity

See article by Candace Keller.

Seydou Keita Untitled (A Malian Woman) 1949–52. Vintage silver print with applied color.

This one is fairly large at 11 ½ x 9 inches.

more common: 5x7, 3x5, snapshot size

This photo is typical of the ones he produced for his sophisticated urban clientele. Hundreds of his negatives that are portraits of individuals and families did survive, but he did not

keep tract of their names, so most are “Untitled” with descriptive titles

added later.

Seydou Keita (Big Man with his Daughter), 1949-1951

Seydou Keita Untitled (Sisters, Two Great Ladies), 1958

Seydou Keita, Untitled (Reclining Woman), 1956-1957

Keita was a master at playing off patterns in the studio set up (the blanket and the curtain draped behind) against what his clients were wearing.

Seydou Keita Untitled

Keita would carefully pose his clients sometimes with props he provided or ones

they brought along (and babies)

Seydou Keita Untitled

VOL. 47, NO. 4 WINTER 2014 african arts | 39

archival and reframing processes, the names of pictured sub- jects—who are primarily responsible for the original creation of these images—have been obscured, as once were those of pho- tographers such as Seydou Keïta and Salla Casset. Overshadow- ing them in these recent contexts are new clients and mediators: the curator, collector, critic, printer, and dealer who, condoned by the collaboration of prominent professional photographers, serve as authoritative agents manipulating and framing the pho- tographs in new ways, as Elizabeth Bigham (1999) has effectively argued with regard to Keïta’s portraits.

Furthermore, the recontextualization of these images within international exhibitions and publications has omitted the authorship of photographers’ apprentices. Since the 1950s, reportage work has remained the domain of young assistant pho- tographers, while studio portraiture and darkroom procedures are the prerogative of professional proprietors. Due to the kind of youthful activities engaged in at parties, dances, and nightclubs, young people patronize photographers of their own generation, correctly presuming that their peers would be more sympathetic to their interests. Sidibé has explained, “It’s not appropriate for an old person to attend the parties of young people. Kids don’t want old people to know what they are doing.”5 Since business is driven by generational ties, established photographers in Mali hire young apprentices around eighteen to twenty years of age to assume their reportage commissions. However, the appointment

is fairly short lived as photographers are deemed “old” once they marry and enter parenthood. Achieving such status typically prompts them to open their own establishment, for which they, too, will need to hire an apprentice to serve the reportage needs of their young clientele.

This brings to light an important and regularly overlooked aspect of the international market for West African photography: the publication and exhibition, without recognition, of appren- tice work remnant in the archives of professional studios. Thus, in an ironic twist, many of the party photographs taken in the 1960s and those capturing youths along the shore of the Niger River during the 1970s, published under the name of Malick Sidibé—the initial basis on which he received global acclaim— were actually composed by his apprentices (Figs. 7–10): Sidiki Sidibé (1961–1970) and Amadou Fané (1968–1974).

5 Seydou Keïta Untitled (c. 1958–1960) Philippe Salaün gelatin silver print Photo: Courtesy CAAC–The Pigozzi Collection, Geneva; © Keïta/SKPEAC

6 Portrait of Seydou Keïta wearing his police uniform (taken sometime between 1962 and 1977), framed and on display in his son’s establishment, Studio Seydou Keïta. Photo: Candace M. Keller, with permission from Baba Keïta, Bamako, 2010

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Candace Keller tells the story of how Keita and Malick Sidibe were “discovered” in the 1990s. Susan Vogel, an art historian

and curator in New York (and the film maker of Living Memory) had acquired some negatives in the 1970s, but she did not record the photographers names. 20 years later she had prints of photos made from the negatives and identified

then as the work of an “anonymous" photographer in an exhibition in 1991 on contemporary African art in New York.

Andre Magnin, a curator and someone who acted as a broker for his wealthy client, Jean Pigozzi, saw the photos and went to

Bamako to “find that photographer”

Keita tells the story in the Youtube video Souvenirs de Seydou Keita 2/5 (see Blackboard)

Part of the story is that Magnin left with some of Keita’s negatives, promising to return. Instead months later Keita is invited to France for an exhibition of his work as an artist, even though before then he did not think of himself as an artist. Magnin and Pigozzi had taken those negatives and

blown them up near life size for this exhibition, even though the original intention was as a small snapshot.

Seydou Keita was active as a commercial photographer between

1948-1963. He also worked for the socialist government, taking mug shots of prisoners, and

identity photos.

Seydou Keita, early self-portrait

VOL. 47, NO. 4 WINTER 2014 african arts | 37

In most cases, enlargements are printed overseas, removing the photographer from a major segment of the re-creative processes. To reprint negatives from the studios of Keïta and Sidibé, Pigozzi and Magnin have consistently commissioned Philippe Salaun and Payram at PICTO in Paris, whose prints exhibit greater contrast than those developed according to ideal skin-tone in Mali (Fig. 5). The surface quality of the images is also regularly transformed in Western reproductions, which typically utilize matte paper, while photographers in Mali prefer a glossy finish. Sidibé has com- plained about this practice, arguing that matte paper is riddled with “pits” that break the clean, fine lines of his images.

Beyond the issue of aesthetic transformations, Magnin’s accounts—about photography in Mali, and the work of Keïta and Sidibé in particular—have helped established market niches for the photographers’ work abroad, while distorting the histori- cal realities of their careers in Bamako. After the publication of

Magnin’s monographs on Keïta (1997) and Sidibé (1998), Keïta has been continually described as the exemplary Malian portrait photographer since the 1940s, which the photographer himself perpetuated in numerous interviews, and Sidibé has been known predominantly as the “reportage” or “party” photographer of the nation’s youth culture during the 1960s and ‘70s. Acknowledging these constructions, Sidibé has stated: “Magnin … didn’t show all of my work. It was more or less just party pictures … Listen … Seydou has a collection of portraits, and so they prefer to show my candid work … I see how it works” (Lamunière 2001:55–56). In fact, despite international renown for freeze-frame party pic- tures, Sidibé prefers the studio, where he believes the best por- traits are created.3

Magnin was also the first to present Keïta as the official State photographer in Mali from 1962–77 (Magnin 1997), when in fact several photographers, including Malim Coulibaly, had occu-

1 Seydou Keïta photographs from the 1950s as printed in Vogel 1991:160.

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Page from Susan Vogel’s exhibition catalogue Africa Explores (1991), with Seydou Keita photograph

labeled as “Unknown Photographer

Jean Pigozzi sends Andre Magnin to Bamako

1995 Exhibitions

Candace Keller “Framed and Hidden Histories”

Keita and Sidibe get “discovered”

Here you see the same images, now blown up near life-size.

After the fact, Keita agreed to it, and signed work printed by commercial

printers in NY and Europe.

In the Youtube video “Seydou Keita in New York” (1997) you see him in the gallery while his work is being hung. Then we see Jean Pigozzi (in the bright green-teal sweater) talking with Keita,

saying that he saw the photos in the exhibition and called Andre (Magnin) and told him : “Tomorrow morning you are going to take a plane and go to

Bamako and find that photographer”

1:54 Art Fair 2019 (London 2013)

(New York 2015)

Danzinger Gallery NYC offered photographs by Keita for sale ($6000-$17000, sizes variable) Almost 20 years after his death, someone is making money from the sale of these works.

Pigozzi is quoted as saying “I own Seydou Keita” in the face of a lawsuit from the Keita family. Offensive, no? On the other hand, Keita did make some money from the original sale of his

work, so he did not die in poverty. The family tried to bring a lawsuit against Pigozzi and Magnin after Keita’s death, but they lost. Pigozzi defends his actions, saying that he was responsible for saving Keita’s work and turning him into an icon of African photography.

Malick Sidibe Self Portrait, 1956

Malick Sidibe (1935-2016)

Similar story to that of Keita. Worked as a professional photographer in Bamako until he

was “discovered” by Andre Magnin.

Malick Sidibe Christmas Night, 1963

Malick Sidibe, Picnic Along Roadside, 1973 Malick Sidibe, Dancing the Twist, 1965

In the West, Sidibe is best known for his photographs of nightlife and parties with young people dancing to the latest music (the Beatles)

Malick Sidibe Surprise Party

The Beatles, 1969

note: printed and signed in 2013

Malick Sidibe, A Ye Ye in Position, 1963

Malick Sidibe, Gentleman posing, 1980

Malick Sidibe Here is my watch and my ring,

1964

Titles all added later by Sidibe

Arrival of the car of the (newly) married couple before city

hall, 1970

printed 2008

As with Keita’s work, Pigozzi and Magnin took Sidibe’s negatives and blew them up life size, turning them into ART (according to the preference of collectors in the West)

Malick Sidibe exhibition at Jack Shainman Gallery in 2005 with

small snapshots mounted in painted glass frames, a typical way of preserving a photo in

Senegal and Mali.

Encouraged by success, Sidibe kept working in his studio right up until his death in 2016. I actually had my

portrait taken by Sidibe with my daughter in 2011 (sorry, I

can't find it to show you)

https://www.google.com/url?sa=i&rct=j&q=&esrc=s&source=images&cd=&ved=2ahUKEwjPi8j94t_kAhVNmlkKHfyqD7gQjRx6BAgBEAQ&url=http://www.jackshainman.com/artist-images39.html&psig=AOvVaw1HMgjGdk0tBAdbMTC8sBw6&ust=1569081443474024

Collection of 38 prints framed with glass frames, sold by Jack

Shainman to a private collector in early 2000’s. February 2019

Auction estimate $ 30-40,000

price realized $ 87,500 Unlikely that Sidibe's family got any of the proceeds of the sale.

In the Youtube video, the interviewer (Manthia Diawara)

says that Sidibe laments the fact that Western dealers

came and bought everything left in his studio, old cameras,

his notebooks, everything.

In the Youtube video, the interviewer (Manthia Diawara)

says that Sidibe laments the fact that Western dealers

came and bought everything left in his studio, old cameras,

his notebooks, everything.

And these now appear for sale, like these pages from

some of his notebooks, price on request.

Malick Sidibe proof prints among the things that were purchased from Sidibe

40 | african arts WINTER 2014 VOL. 47, NO. 4

9 Sidiki Sidibé, Bamako, 2004 Photo: Candace M. Keller, with permission from Sidiki Sidibé

10 Amadou Fané, Bamako, 2004 Photo: Candace M. Keller, with permission from Amadou Fané

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40 | african arts WINTER 2014 VOL. 47, NO. 4

9 Sidiki Sidibé, Bamako, 2004 Photo: Candace M. Keller, with permission from Sidiki Sidibé

10 Amadou Fané, Bamako, 2004 Photo: Candace M. Keller, with permission from Amadou Fané

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Amadou Fane (apprenticed 1968-1974)

Sidiki Sidibe (apprenticed 1961-1970)

Candace Keller brings up another problem = the question of authorship. Legally the photos taken by apprentices belong to the master. Many of Malick Sidibe’s and Seydou Keita’s most famous

images may actually have been taken by apprentices doing “reportage”. Might be nice if they too got some of the credit, and perhaps some of the royalties, no?

Sokkelund's African Collection is an exhibition and conservation project for the works of old West African portrait photographers.

The project came into the world by chance, says photographer Svend Erik Sokkelund, who had traveled to West Africa in 1994-95 to meet some of his African colleagues on their 'home ground':

"It was a coincidence that one day I sat in Mopti, in northern Mali, with a pile of dusty, very dirty and curly black-and-white negatives and thought completely fascinated: 'This I must have' with me and take pictures of. It must not be lost! '

I knew that if I put the old negatives away again, an important piece of Mali's history would disappear. ”

He was allowed to do that, and he ended up borrowing some negatives for Denmark, where he cleaned them and made the first exhibition pictures. It was the start of Sokkelund's African Collection, which has since been expanded with more

negatives and more photographers and today includes more than 200 exhibition photos.

The photos were taken by a number of Mali's talented portrait photographers who made photography their way of life and established popular studios in the capital, Bamako, and in Mali's second largest city, Mopti.

Profits from image sales are shared with photographers or their families.

Candace Keller concludes her article with a reference to the kind of piracy of negatives that continues to go

on under the pretense of “saving” the images.

She mentions this photographer who claims to share the profits of the sale of their photographs with the

families, but this is not the case.

http://www.africancollection.dk