Seydou Keïta

Born c. 1921, Bamako, Mali
Worked and lived in Bamako. Died in 2001, Paris, France

Seydou Keïta’s photographs eloquently portray Bamako society during its era of transition from a cosmopolitan French colony to an independent capital.  Initially trained by his father to be a carpenter, Keïta’s career as a photographer was launched in 1935 by an uncle who gave him his first camera, a Kodak Brownie Flash, which he had purchased during a trip to Senegal. During his adolescence Keïta mastered the technical challenges of shooting and printing; he later purchased a large-format camera. The larger format not only offered an exceptional degree of resolution, it also made it possible for Keïta to make high quality contact prints without the aid of an enlarger.  In 1948 he opened his own studio in Bamako and he quickly built up a successful business. Whether photographing single individuals, families, or professional associations, Keïta balanced a strict sense of formality with a remarkable level of intimacy with his subjects.  Like many professional photographers, he furnished his studio with numerous props, from backdrops and costumes, to Vespas and luxury cars.  He would renew these props every few years, which later allowed him to establish a chronology for his work.  Keïta commented on his studio practice, “It’s easy to take a photo, but what really made a difference was that I always knew how to find the right position, and I was never wrong. Their head slightly turned, a serious face, the position of the hands... I was capable of making someone look really good.”
Keïta went to exceptional lengths to bring out the beauty of his subjects and the brilliant patterns of his backdrops proved a particularly effective foil. He worked intuitively, reinventing portrait photography through his search for extreme precision. In 1962 the newly installed Socialist government made Keïta its official photographer; shortly thereafter he closed down his studio, although he remained active until his retirement in 1977. His archive of over 10,000 negatives was gradually brought to light in the early 1990s; Keïta has since achieved international recognition.

Inventive and highly modern, his emphasis on the essential components of portrait photography—light, subject, and framing—firmly establishes Keïta among the twentieth-century masters of the genre.

 

Collections

Fondation Cartier pour l'art contemporain, Paris, France
21C Museum Fondation, Louisville, USA
Akron Art Museum, Akron, USA
Bronx Museum of Art, Bronx, New-Yor, USA
Credit Suisse Trust Collection, Swissertland
Detroit Institute of Arts Detroit, MI
Fogg Art Museum, Harvard University Art Museums, Cambridge, England
Harn Museum of Art, University of Florida, Gainesville, USA
Los Angeles County Art Museum, Los Angeles, USA
Metropolitan Museum of Art, Department of Arts of Africa/Oceania, New York, USA
Michael C. Carlos Museum, Ermory University, Atlanta, USA
Moderna Museet, Stockholm, Sweden
Museum of Modern Art, New York, USA
Norton Family Collection, Santa Monica, USA
Philadelphia Museum of Art, Philadelphia, USA
Princeton University Art Museum, Princeton, USA
Saint Louis Museum of Art, Saint Louis, USA
Trinity College, Douglas Hyde Gallery, Dublin, Ireland
University of Chicago, Chicago, USA
US Department of State Collection, Washington D.C., USA
William Benton Museum of Art, University of Connecticut, Storrs, USA
Fondation Alliances, Casablanca, Maroc
Fond de dotation agnès.b, Paris, France