VISUAL GRIOTS - A photography workshop for children in Tominian, Mali

Visual Griots, a photography workshop for the children of Tominian, Mali, is being launched in response to the recent emergence of Bamako as the center for the photographic arts in Africa. This project’s unique goal is to support and enrich this nascent artistic community by enabling Malian children, through a one-week workshop: to become contemporary griots and tell their communities’ stories through photography; to foster cultural exchange by including world renowned Malian photographer Alioune Bâ in the workshop team; and to train an emerging Malian photographer of the Seydou Keïta Photography Center in the methods and techniques of workshop instruction, with the aim of replicating similar workshops through the Center.

The Visual Griots project benefits from the expertise of three Washington D.C.-based photographers, Nestor Hernández, Sora DeVore, and Shawn Davis. Hernández and Devore have led celebrated photography projects for children in Ghana, Cuba, West Virginia and Washington D.C. Davis, who has widely published his work on Mali, also brings to the team a wealth of knowledge on Malian language and culture, stemming from his years spent there as a Peace Corps volunteer. Nestor Hernández traveled to Mali in October, 2003, to lay the groundwork for the project. The workshop is being organized in Mali through ASVIGNE (Association Vigne), an NGO run by Malian Jude Théra, a native of Tominian, now based in Bamako.

Images resulting from the project will first be shared with the community of Tominian. The pan-african photography biennial, African Photography Encounters has recently agreed to exhibit the children’s work the 2005 festival, to be held in Bamako. Finally, the works will become a part of the permanent collection of the Seydou Keïta Photography House, a new photographic gallery and resource center in Bamako. We also intend for Visual Griots to eventually be shown at the Focus Gallery of the African Voices exhibit, curated by Mary Jo Arnoldi, at the Smithsonian Museum of Natural History.

Visual Griots, has received generous funding from the Academy for Educational Development in Washington, D.C. See www.aed.org.

Connecting to Mali’s Photographic Traditions

Mali is fast becoming the center for the photographic arts in Africa. Several Malian photographers have received international acclaim, most notably Seydou Keïta, Malick Sidibe and Alioune Bâ.

Every two years, Bamako hosts the African Photography Encounters, a major photography conference and festival that draws image makers from around the world. The Visual Griot project will be represented at the sixth annual African Photography Encounters in November, 2005, through a display of the children’s work. Their images will also be displayed in Tominian so that the village youth and the greater community will have the opportunity to celebrate the children’s work.

The works will then become a part of the permanent collection of the Seydou Keïta Photography House, a new photographic gallery and resource center in Bamako named after the eminent photographer Seydou Keïta, considered the father of African studio photographers. Malian photographer Alioune Bâ, director of the Seydou Keïta Photography House, is co-teaching the workshop.

In the United States, the images by the children of Tominian will be show in a number of venues. Our team is currently working with representatives of the African Voices exhibit at the Smithsonian Museum of Natural History, as well as a number of other potential venues in Washington, D.C and elsewhere throughout the United States.

Workshop Structure

The workshop benefits from organizational support on the ground in Mali through ASVIGNE (Association Vigne), a non-governmental organization run by Malian Jude Théra, who was born in Tominian and has strong ties to the region. Students ages 9-12 from the Kuwara and Damy primary schools will be selected for the workshop by ASVIGNE, school, and community officials. The class will take place from for three days at each of the schools with 10 students from each school.

Washington, D.C. photographers Nestor Hernández, Shawn Davis, Sora DeVore, and Malian photographer Alioune Bâ will work with the young people, introducing them to photography through assignments designed to increase the children’s appreciation and awareness of community and family life. The children, in essence, become contemporary griots, telling their communities’ stories through photography.

The griot tradition in West Africa is very strong, especially in Mali. Until Muslim traders brought Arabic writing to the area, West Africa had no written language. Instead of writing histories, West Africans memorized and retold them from generation to generation. A griot is a musician and oral historian whose job it is to memorize and recount events and lineages of the past, and preserve those of the current day for the future. Most griots can trace entire family histories back to ancient times, through music and song. Griots constitute a separate group within Malian society. This important role is passed from fathers and mothers to sons and daughters, who grow up to become their family’s next oral historian.

Visual Griots seeks to connect with this artistic tradition of documentation and interpretation of village life, and reinforce, and build upon it by introducing the youth of Mali to the photographic arts.

Throughout the workshop, children will use photography and writing to tell their stories. By giving the children these tools, the Visual Griots project will help them put what they see into a form that communicates their world to the community at large. They will use photography as a way of defining their world and affirming their control over important aspects of it.

Fieldtrip to Djenne: Mali’s UNESCO World Heritage Site

The workshop will culminate with a field trip to the ancient island city of Djenne, a UNESCO World Heritage Site, renowned for its monumental Sudanese architecture. The vast majority of students in the Visual Griots workshop will have never visited Djenne, which is located 100 miles from Tominian. After spending the week in Tominian documenting various aspects of their daily lives, the Djenne component of the workshop will provide the students with the opportunity to document a foreign environment and new experience. Through the resulting images we will be able to compare and contrast the images taken in Tominian and Djenne.

Inhabited since 250 B.C., Djenné became a market centre and an important link in the trans-Saharan gold trade. In the 15th and 16th centuries, it was one of the centers for the propagation of Islam. Its traditional houses, of which nearly 2,000 have survived, are built on hillocks (toguere) as protection from the seasonal floods. The use of local materials, such as mud and palm wood, the incorporation of conventional styles, and the adaptation to the hot climate of West Africa are expressions of the architecture’s elegant connection to the local environment. Such earthen architecture, which is found throughout Mali, will last for centuries as it’s commonly maintained.

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