Look Inside
Which art books, prints and posters are available by and about this artist? Here is a sample of items of interest to a typical collector:
This publication, which accompanies an exhibition at the Brooklyn Museum held in 2025, draws from across Keïta's rich oeuvre, spanning iconic portraits and rarely seen vintage prints to never-before-shown negatives, to explore the social and political realities of the period. The catalog was informed and enriched by contributions from the Keïta family, including their loan of negatives from the family archive and oral histories.
Born in Bamako, Mali, Seydou Keïta (1921/23–2001) spent his youth working as a carpenter, following in the footsteps of his father. He shifted his focus to photography after receiving a Kodak Brownie Flash camera as a gift from his uncle in 1935. Between 1948 and 1963, Keïta photographed thousands of Malians and West Africans, becoming widely recognized across the region. In the early 1990s, his work reached Western viewers, cementing Keïta as one of the premier studio photographers of 20th-century Africa, a peer of August Sander, Irving Penn and Richard Avedon.
