Writing Mali into Light: Seydou Keïta’s Photography at the Grand Palais - Part 2

By Sojourner Ahébée

The word “photography” comes from the Greek roots photos, meaning light, and graphé, meaning drawing or writing. In other words, photography is writing with light. And that is just what Seydou Keïta did with his camera. He wrote Mali into light, love, and liberation.

Keïta had a profound love and respect for the Black woman, and his ability to give Black women in his photographs their own sense of dignity and beauty continues to amaze. So naturally, some of the most touching images from the exhibition were images of Black women: women on motorcycles; women with their children; women with their husbands, boyfriends, and lovers; women alongside other women looking out for one another; women standing; women with their bodies reclined across the ground; women with gold hanging from their necks; women working their sewing machines; women being proud to be women.

Seydou Keïta
Untitled, 1959-60
120 x 180 cm
Private collection, Paris

Seydou Keïta
Untitled, 1949
50 x 60 cm
Collection Fondation Cartier pour l’art contemporain, Paris
In a general sense, the post-independent period in many African nations across the continent was marked by many promises. But women, many African women in particular, were often excluded from such promises, as they continued to be oppressed by traditional forces and customs that had existed before the colonial period. Some of these things included gender roles, female genital mutilation, expectation to marry, etc.

As independence from French colonial powers granted African men a new sense of freedom and opportunity, African women could not subscribe so easily into these new notions of liberation. They were still fighting for their bodies and their agency, things that were recognized neither by both the colonial regime, nor by much of the African male population. But Keïta’s commitment to rendering the African woman visible, powerful, and as existing for herself in lieu of the eyes and appetites of others is truly a testament to his desire to include the African woman in this new, liberated Africa.

Keïta is often remembered for his images of “the reclining woman”. Throughout the exhibition there were endless photographs of women spread out across the ground in a reclining manner, as they relaxed, held their children, or leaned against a lover. The African woman, and by extension the Black woman, is often depicted as an endurer of pain and trauma. By constantly providing us with images of African women in moments of leisure and tranquility, Keïta stresses the necessity for a space in which the African woman can know peace and pleasure.

Seydou Keïta
Untitled (Couple allongé), 1952-55
120 x 180 cm
Galerie MAGNIN-A, Paris

Seydou Keïta
Untitled, 1959 (Left) & Untitled, 1958 (Right)
120 x 180 cm (Left) & 127 x 180 (Right)

Seydou Keïta
Untitled, 1949
120 x 180 cm
Collection agnès b., Paris
Keïta also makes use of his portraits as tools for African women to imagine their strength and agency in a modern and urbanized African society. The machine inevitably becomes intricately connected to the Malian woman’s everyday life. Whether she is headed to a party on her motorcycle, making a dress on her sewing machine, or listening to the latest hit on the radio, the machine becomes a dominant mode of expression of power and elation throughout the photographs.

Seydou Keïta
Untitled, 1953
77 x 60 cm
Finally, Keïta affirms and validates spaces for women to enjoy the company of one another. Here, their happiness, beauty, and value are not determined by the presence of men. Rather, a purely female, African joy is centered, allowing African women to find worth in their love for one another.

Seydou Keïta
Untitled, 1956-57
127 x 180 cm

Seydou Keïta
Untitled, 1959-1960
50 x 60 cm
Collection Fondation Cartier pour l’art contemporain, Paris

Seydou Keïta
Untitled, 1956-57
127 x 180 cm

Paris’s Grand Palais, one of the city’s most beloved national galleries, was home to the Seydou Keïta photography exhibition from March 31st to July 11th, 2016.

Sojourner Ahébée is a 2016 BOSP Continuation International Fellow for the Haas Center for Public Service at Stanford University. She is currently serving as the Paris intern for the Wells International Foundation.

Read more of Sojourner's work at Sojourner Ahébée.

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Writing Mali into Light: Seydou Keïta’s Photography at the Grand Palais - Part 1

By Sojourner Ahébée

The word “photography” comes from the Greek roots photos, meaning light, and graphé, meaning drawing or writing. In other words, photography is writing with light. And that is just what Seydou Keïta did with his camera. He wrote Mali into light, love, and liberation.

These days I am often thinking about the Black body. I am thinking about Alton Sterling, Philando Castile, and the way this list of bodies will be longer by the time I'm done writing this. I am thinking about the camera and what it takes to make you see. I am thinking about the camera and what it means to look, what it means to attend to history, what it means to attend to violence you cannot stop, what it means to attend to violence the Black body has lived through for centuries.

Seydou Keïta was unapologetic in his celebration of the Black body, and Black joy. Through his photos, he invited Black folks on the African continent and across the diaspora to take up space, to love, to dance, to find their truest selves. In light of all the recent police terror that has plagued the Black body in the U.S., the recent exhibition of his work at Paris’s Grand Palais -- and by extension, the full body of his work -- asked me to imagine a future where the Black body can be safe, joyous and alive in all of its possibilities.

Seydou Keïta exhibition flier
Keïta, who was born in 1921 in the French colony of French Sudan (now known as modern-day Mali), was initially be trained as a carpenter by his father from the age of seven. But in 1935 after his uncle’s trip to Senegal, Keïta was gifted with his very first camera -- a Kodak Brownie to be exact -- prompting him to re-imagine his calling and his role in a country navigating transition between its colonial identity and its approaching independence.

Keïta followed his passion for photography throughout the years, and became intimately invested in the portrait. Through his photographs, he conjured the power to give his community visibility and beauty in a world that worked to deny them even those simple things. In 1948, he opened his own photography studio near the train station in Bamako and quickly became a success in the bustling city, as voyagers hailing from all over West Africa as well as young Malian urbanites living in the city flocked to Keïta to have their photos taken.

Twelve years later, French Sudan would gain its independence (1960) and becomes the Republic of Mali. Keïta’s portraits frequent the urgency of such a transition. Here, the personal becomes political. Keita’s portraits become the act of affirming, centering, and naming an African identity post-independence. They are the act of telling an African story of survival, as well as the African desire for modernity from a purely African perspective.

Seydou Keïta at work
Screenshot from "Souvenirs de Seydou Keïta 4/5"
Seydou Keïta at the Grand Palais asks viewers to step into a 20th-century Mali that is rocking back and forth between its tradition and its modernity. For Mali, it is the era of big radios and motorcycles, of men in suits. It is the era of fast trains and long cars. It is the era of families moving into big cities. It is the era of the photograph, it is the era of the black, African body asking to be seen.

The emergence of and need for a post-colonial, modern, Malian aesthetic and identity is evident in many of the photos. But the love and preservation of a traditional Mali, whether that be through the strong presence of African cloth and fashion or the recurring image of traditional ceremonies, celebrations, and marriages, is also evident. Keïta shows us a Mali that is able imagine both worlds for itself.

Seydou Keita
Untitled, 1954
120 x 180 x 4 cm
Image courtesy of Sojourner Ahébée
Keïta’s portraits also bring to the forefront a greater conversation between the West and former, African colonial subjects. Many of the individuals in the portraits sport Westerns fashions and standards of elegance, further establishing a kind of African obsession with Western standards of success and wealth. But this conversation is complicated by a violent and oppressive French colonial history in Mali, rendering the prevalence of Western aesthetics in the photos -- as well as the ways in which they are often paired with traditional, Malian fashion -- as subversive, or, in some sense, as a muscular reacquisition of power and African identity and humanity.

Modernity does not belong to the West, and Keïta’s subjects -- who are often local Malian citizens -- work to challenge the West’s claim on such an aesthetic by clothing themselves in both Malian as well as “Western” modes of dress. Furthermore, this creative and empowering metissage of cultures allows them to imagine a Malian identity that escapes any singular or static notion of existence.

Seydou Keita
Untitled, 1959
120 x 99 cm
Image courtesy of Sojourner Ahébée
Keïta was often searching for a space where the newly-independent, modern Mali and the Mali of a traditional, African past could meet. His portraits provided him with such a space. Keïta developed a deep love and important obsession with Malian textile and cloth. The vast majority of his portraits in the exhibition included large and vibrantly-colored pieces of African textile draped behind his subjects.

Seydou Keita
Untitled (Deux Femmes-fond), 1956
180 x 120 cm
Galerie MAGNIN-A, Paris
Image courtesy of Sojourner Ahébée
Before each shoot, Keïta would meticulously select the piece of cloth he planned to include in the photograph. Cloth in the West African tradition maintains a significant part of West African identity and expression. Many cloths carry their own particular meanings (and stories), and often these meanings create a system of rules and rituals that dictate when and where such a cloth can be worn. So, as post-independent Malians in the photographs are depicted in their suits, or leaning against their shiny radios, Keïta situates the African cloth as a backdrop and as a spirited and colorful reminder of a traditional Malian identity and aesthetic. The cloths that he chooses are often bold in color and in pattern, further making tangible a dynamic and animated Black joy, post-independence.

Seydou Keita
Untitled, 1956-57
90 x 130 cm
Image courtesy of Sojourner Ahébée
Paris’s Grand Palais, one of the city’s most beloved national galleries, was home to the Seydou Keïta photography exhibition from March 31st to July 11th, 2016.

Sojourner Ahébée is a 2016 BOSP Continuation International Fellow for the Haas Center for Public Service at Stanford University. She is currently serving as the Paris intern for the Wells International Foundation.

Read more of Sojourner's work at Sojourner Ahébée.

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A Little Bit of Africa at Fair Trade Show

Last Sunday, Tom and I visited the Paris suburb of Alfortville to attend the last day of the 13th edition of the Journées du Commerce Equitable (Fair Trade Days) at the Mairie (town hall). Alfortville is proud to have won the title of "Fair Trade Territory" in 2009 and 2012, and is committed to raising awareness of the importance of responsible and socially-conscious commerce.

Trade show banner
© Discover Paris!
We partook of a light "brunch" of products donated by Artisans du Monde, including honey, jams, chocolates, and fruit juices, then took a tour of the many stands that bordered the square in front of the town hall. We enjoyed a mini-concert by the group PARADISE, which regaled participants with Antillean music,



PARADISE
© Discover Paris!
and then visited three stands that were of particular interest. The first was for AKAME, an association that promotes products made from Cameroonian cloth.



AKAME
© Discover Paris!
The next was ARTOK PARIS. This group, along with several others in Paris and the surrounding suburbs, supports the Humaine Promotion of Tokombéré Project. Tokombéré is a town and commune in northern Cameroon. The women of this area create fine baskets, pocketbooks, tablecloths, and other items. Two French women were selling these products at the fair.



ARTOK-PARIS
© Discover Paris!
Finally, we stopped by the stand for BAŠTINA VOYAGES, an organization that promotes equitable tourism. We met Stefan Buljat, president of the organization, several weeks ago on a walking tour of the Château Rouge quarter of the 18th arrondissement called "Petit Mali" ("Little Mali"). Baština's mission is to encourage the French to travel to countries such as Mali, Senegal, Georgia (former USSR), and Croatia by introducing them to a slice of culture from the destination country before they ever leave Paris.

Stefan Buljat, president of Baština Voyages
© Discover Paris!
In keeping with its mission, Baština is participating in Paris Ville Monde, which is being billed as "a month to tour the world in Paris." Beginning on May 31st with the Bal de l'Afrique Enchantée (Enchanted Africa Ball), the event runs through June 30th. For more information, visit www.paris-ville-monde.com.

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The Spirit of Africa at Parc de la Villette

Paris' Parc de la Villette is celebrating culture in a big way this summer.  Since July 10th, this complex of lawns, gardens, concert halls, exhibit spaces, museums, and theaters has welcomed visitors to Scènes d'Eté (Scenes of Summer)—an astounding series of concerts, workshops, expositions, and films that provide something for everyone to enjoy.  A large number of the activities will evoke the food, folklore, and music of Africa.

 La Grande Halle

© Discover Paris!

Today, my husband Tom and I had the great pleasure to see the Drum Masters of Burundi perform on the lawn to the right of the Grande Halle.  I cannot remember the last time that I have seen performers give so much of themselves as these men did today.  The rhythms...the chants...the movements...all were spellbinding!  After about a half-hour of performing on the lawn, they "took the show on the road," walking around the park leading a parade of visitors.

  Maîtres Tambours de Burundi

© Discover Paris!

We had hoped to attend a cooking demonstration of African cuisine today, but did not realize that we needed to reserve.  Nor did we realize that the event costs 12 euros per person.  When we arrived at the park, we were told that the class was full!  On the menu were:

Plantains drizzled with bissap tea
Fish Saka-Saka (fish with crushed manioc leaves)
Mango with citrus coulis
Ginger juice

Celebrity actress Fatou N'Diaye was supposed to be at the event, but we'll never know if she appeared this week.

The demonstration will be held again next Sunday, so hopefully we will be able to attend then.

Music All et les Illuminés "Black Stamp" gave a free concert of jazz, soul, funk, R and B, and hip hop at the Prairie du Cercle Sud stage late this afternoon.

The Cabaret Sauvage theater held events devoted to Malian culture the entire weekend.  There was an African marketplace in the area between the theater and the canal.  On Friday, there were two art workshops for children and an Afro Hip Hop concert.  On Saturday, there were cooking demonstrations, Malian storytelling, and a Malian fusion concert.  This evening, there will be a dance workshop and an African ball that will last until dawn.

Cabaret Sauvage

© Discover Paris!

 Jewelry for Sale at the African Marketplace

© Discover Paris!

Children's Art Workshop

© Discover Paris!

Most of the events that are scheduled for the summer are free, including several concerts.  Next Sunday, in addition to the cooking demonstration, there will be free music by Naby (Senegal) and Mounira Mitchala (Chad).

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  Entrée to Black Paris™ is a Discover Paris! blog.