Rabat – A collection of Malian photographer Malick Sidibe’s work is currently being shown at the Mohammed IV Museum of Modern and Contemporary Art in Rabat.
Titled “Africa seen by its photographers, from Malick Sidibe to nowadays,” the exhibition features the iconic Malian photographer and a whole generation of past African portraitists.
Morocco’s National Museums Foundation (FNM) is launching its new cultural season with the exhibition.
Malick Sidibé, born in 1930, is one of the pioneers of African photography. Before his death in 1990, he immortalized the effervescence and joy of Bamako nights through his portraits.
The exhibition centers around the evolution of contemporary African photography, while exploring various axes of the art from African photographers.
By bridging a multitude of artists under one exhibition, the goal of the event is to introduce Moroccan art fans to a collective narrative of African artists.
A second focus of the exhibition is to show the richness of the African photographic scene, in addition to making statements on the social-political realities and postcolonial legacies still affected by a “Western imprint,” especially in South Africa.
Most of the works on display explore the alienation and landscapes of disaster that have plagued post-colonial African countries of the continent, FMN noted, adding that many pieces in the exhibit “speak of the survival of the excluded as much as of planetary overexploitation.”
The exhibition will allow visitors to trace the trajectory of the work of African photographers from the independence years until today.
Bringing together all these works in Morocco is a great first, proving that the Kingdom plays a key role in the cultural and artistic development on the African continent.
