Malian Portrait Photography

This catalogue introduces readers to Malian photographers Malick Sidibé and Seydou Keïta and others whose images visualize an influential form of post-colonial African identity.

The influence of Malian photographers Malick Sidibé and Seydou Keïta has been widespread since their emergence on the international scene in the 1990s. Their intimate black and white photos integrate pattern, decoration, portraiture, and iconography in entirely new ways, bespeaking a new post-colonial African identity. This catalogue features an essay and artist biographies that survey the major practitioners and innovators in Mali. Designed by artist François Deschamps, the book accompanies an exhibition of vintage and recent prints by Keïta and Sidibé, as well as Hamidou Maïga, Abdourahmane Sakaly, and Tijani Àdìgún Sitou, curated by Daniel Leers at the Samuel Dorsky Museum of Art.