Every trip to the Brooklyn Museum is special . . . but today, it would be doubly so because two exhibitions make their debut: one highlighting Malian photographer Seydou Keïta, who transformed portraiture, and another celebrating contemporary artists’ everyday acts of rebellion. Learn more below, and plan your visit today.
Encounter an artist who changed the face of portrait photography. Seydou Keïta: A Tactile Lens is the most expansive North American exhibition of the legendary Malian photographer’s work to date. Over 280 works include iconic prints, never-before-seen portraits, textiles, and Keïta’s personal artifacts, all brought to life with unique insights from his family.
Organized by the Brooklyn Museum, the exhibition brings us to Bamako from the late 1940s to early 1960s, an era of profound political and social transformation. Collaborating closely with his sitters, Keïta recorded Mali’s evolution through their choices of backdrops, accessories, and apparel, from traditional finery to European suits.
These bold yet sensitive photographs began to circulate in West Africa nearly 80 years ago. In the early 1990s, they reached Western viewers, rocking the art world and cementing Keïta as the premier studio photographer of 20th-century Africa—a peer of August Sander, Irving Penn, and Richard Avedon.
Rebellion can be big, loud, and unmissable—or quiet, subtle, and deeply personal. Inspired by feminist icon Gloria Steinem’s bestseller Outrageous Acts and Everyday Rebellions, this exhibition reveals how contemporary artists infuse daily life with mindful gestures of creative defiance.
New acquisitions in the Center for Feminist Art appear alongside rarely seen collection objects, spanning continents and centuries. From Beverly Semmes’s cascading velvet dresses that symbolize female harmony to Sarah Sze’s sculptural installation that reflects on nature’s fragility, these works spark conversations that can be held only at the Brooklyn Museum.
Seydou KeĂŻta: A Tactile Lens is organized by guest curator Catherine E. McKinley with Imani Williford, Curatorial Assistant, Photography, Fashion, and Material Culture, Brooklyn Museum.
Exhibition soundtrack created by Nile Rodgers and Chmba.
Significant support is provided by the Leonian Charitable Trust.
Generous support is provided by Tom Healy and Fred P. Hochberg, Elizabeth and William Kahane, and VLISCO.
Additional support is provided by Isabel Stainow Wilcox.
Everyday Rebellions: Collection Conversations is organized by Catherine Morris, Curatorial Chair and Sackler Senior Curator, with Carla Forbes, Curatorial Assistant, Elizabeth A. Sackler Center for Feminist Art.
From the top: Brooklyn Museum. (Photo: Adrianna Glaviano); Seydou Keïta. Untitled, 1953–57, printed ca. 1994–2001. Gelatin silver print. Courtesy of The Jean Pigozzi African Art Collection. © SKPEAC/Seydou Keïta, courtesy The Jean Pigozzi Collection of African Art and Danziger Gallery, NY; Alison Kuo. You Pick the Moon, 2024. Found porcelain, glass, faux pearls, rabbit fur, fishing net, plastic decor, glue, silk, plywood, and beads. Brooklyn Museum, Purchase gift of Carla Shen and Christopher Schott, Jennifer and Jerry Lee, Andy Gao and Peter Wei, and Leslie and David Puth, 2024.57. © Alison Kuo. (Photo: Brooklyn Museum)
