“The new generation of photographers and photojournalists must appropriate the notion of authorship. A professional posture that makes them more financially independent and less dependent on orders from the press.” These words are from photographer Boubacar Touré Mandémory. He was the guest of the periodic meeting of exchanges on photography “Parlons Photo”, organized by the National Union of Photographers of Senegal (UNPJS). Icon of photography and awarded several times, Boubacar Touré Mandémory invites young people to take initiatives, that is to say not just wait for the order to go into the field.
“I advise young people to place themselves on the information production chain not as a simple performer but as authors in their own right,” said the experienced photographer. Not without adding: “a photographer can and must seize a question, an idea, a subject and treat it without necessarily obeying the diktat of immediacy which characterizes the work of the press photographer” .
After several years of photojournalistic practice, Boubacar Touré Mandémory has favored author work for a very long time. He thus deals with “a subject which concerns him, and which, in a short or long time, will have an impact on the community”.
Boubacar Touré Mandémory says he is optimistic about the future of photography in Senegal. “When young photographers come together around the challenges of their work, when young photographers talk during exchange sessions, capacity building in photography, the photographic approach or the question of distribution, we can only ‘Be optimistic,’ he said.
Born in Dakar in 1956, Boubacar Touré Mandémory is a photographer whose work has left its mark on the artistic scene. He is the author of several works exhibited in France and elsewhere. He has been working for around forty years on his environment and on the ethnic groups that make up Senegal. He received the 2020 Prize from the Pan-African Press Association Mokanda for his series “Colors and Faces of Ndingler”.
Mariame DJIGO
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