We're at the Getty Center,
standing in the study room of
the Department of Photographs,
looking at this large print by
Malick Sidibe.
A woman is seated with her back
to us in front of a stripped
backdrop. She's in a state of
partial undress, with her
right arm extended toward her
right foot.
For a photographic print, this
is fairly large. It's unusual
because we're seeing the
photograph behind glass that has
this brilliantly painted frame.
It makes the black and white
nature of the photograph feel
rich with texture and tone, and
it draws our eye in. We're
talking about the late 1950s.
This was a critical moment in
the history of Mali, which would
gain its independence from
French colonial rule in 1960.
In 1962, the photographer opens
his own studio. People would
come to his studio in its heyday,
lining up on the street outside,
to have black and white
photographs taken by the artist.
These were photographs that
would be hung on people's walls.
They were an expression of their
identity. The artist describes
women coming in after they had
their hair done. Men coming
wanting to be photographed with
a radio. The artist speaks about
the ways in which he was their
partner in bringing out for the
camera who they really were.
While this is not a commercial
portrait photograph, we can see
the artist turning back to
poses that he developed while
working as a commercial portrait
photographer.
This is so different from what
we would expect from a
traditional portrait photograph.
We barely see this woman's face.
Instead, the forms of her body,
the patterns that surround her
really come to the fore.
We have these sandals in the
foreground that are giving us a
sense of movement and
narrative that harken back to
the cinematic influences that
the artist was looking to. He
said about this pose that this
was inspired by mid-century Euro-
American films that were popular
in Bamako in which the actor
would leave the scene, perhaps
throwing a jacket over their
shoulder and confidently
strutting away.
Here the artist is taking a
cinematic convention and
reconstructing it within a still
photograph.
The shell space that the
photographer has arranged the
sitter in brings her closer to
us. It creates a sort of
intimacy that's also reflected
in her state of partial undress.
He is very deliberate in the way
that he constructs these images.
You can tell the care and
attention that the photographer
took in composing this image in
the way that the vertical strips
of the backdrop play against the
woman's braids. The diagonal of
her braids leads your eye to the
vertical stripe and back down to
her face. It also draws
attention to her earring. This
photograph was created the same
year that he won the Hasselblad
Award. Just four years later, he
would go on to win a Golden Lion
for Lifetime Achievement at the
Venice Biennale.
This photograph seems to be the
product of a lifelong career as
a commercial photographer. A man
who now has the international
attention that has allowed him
to free his creative impulses,
but still drawing on his
experiences as a commercial
photographer.
The years of commercial practice
allowed Sidibe to hone this
skillset in presenting his
sitters in the best possible
light.
This particular photograph, and
the series which it belongs to,
was made for an international
audience. It's a larger scale
than his commercial photography
generally was. It's interesting
to understand this particular
pose with the knowledge that
this was made for an
international audience, because
it does seem that Sidibe is
drawing on not only Malian
traditions, but also long
traditions in the history of art
in the West. Reclining nudes by
, by Valazquez, and
by many others. Here, made by
an African artist coming out of
a career that was dedicated to
serving an African audience, and
here seems to self-consciously
re-interpreting that European
tradition. The art historian
Candace Keller has said that in
interviews with the artist, she
learned that Sidibe generously
shared the profits of this
photographic series with the
sitters, helping to support his
immediate community.