Seydou Keita

Seydou Keïta was born in 1921 in Bamako, Mali. He began photography with a small Kodak Brownie Flash in 1935. He opened his studio in 1948 and specialized in portraiture which he produced to order in natural light and in black and white. He was very successful very quickly and the inhabitants of Bamako, Mali and West Africa flocked to his studio. One poses there alone, in couple, in family, in group, between friends, framed in three quarter bust, or in feet, almost always positioned by Keïta himself who wants to give of his customers the most beautiful image. In his studio, clients can have their picture taken with chic clothes, hats and accessories, as well as a radio, bicycle, scooter or car that Keïta provides them with. The photographer uses decorative patterned backgrounds that he renews every two or three years. His photographs constitute an exceptional testimony of Malian society from the end of the 1940s to 1963. From Independence, he became an official photographer for the Malian government and retired in 1977. His work, rediscovered at the beginning of the 90s has been shown around the world. He intuitively reinvented the art of portraiture through the search for extreme precision. A grace, an elegance shines through all his images. He died in 2001.