Adama Kouyaté, Les trois amis, 1971.
The entire studio fits in a small room, just over 40 square feet. There’s no need for more. Two high-voltage lamps are plugged into a round, made-in-China power strip, just in case, to light a striped curtain. Behind the curtain, a bit of wallpaper representing a seaside landscape with palm trees and flower beds can easily be made out—a landscape of Chinese dreams. This decor serves as backdrop for the images to come. In front of this scene, an ordinary wooden stool awaits. Outside, seated on a nylon-strap chair, the studio photographer also awaits potential clients. If, after this ritual waiting, one shows up, the photographer has him sit on the stool in front of the backdrop. He turns on the lamps. He leans over his camera, glues his eye to the shutter and shoots. He winds up the roll of film, sets an appointment for the customer to pick up the photo and begins awaiting the next likely client.
Confined inside the territory of their studios, a few of these “sentry-duty” photographers have imagined tricks and perfected strategies to attract a clientele. They have acquired accessories (radios, briefcases, Vespas, bouquets of plastic flowers), built sets (multipart frescoes, painted backgrounds, various wall hangings) and prepared costumes (bowler hats, close-fitting jackets, multicolored ties)—all bought at top prices—so that the person being photographed can become more beautiful than he might be otherwise for the duration of the shoot.
With each passing shot, these silent magicians, servants to a narcissistic luxury, have become artists. They are true directors, awaiting the arrival of a subject they can magnify inside a “perfectly decked out,” space. The African photo studio is an artistic space par excellence. There, intimacy can be invented and freedom is always present.
Adama Kouyaté, La famille, 1954.
Photographic production in Mali began with the first European explorer missions and continued with photo studios established in Bamako, the capital, and run by European or Lebanese traders. African photographers entered the picture only toward the end of the 1930s. Printing apprentices, errand boys or housekeeping attendants at first, almost all of them learned the trade through their contact with the master photographer, a white man, who employed them. Then the magic reeled them in. And with varying degrees of success, they opened the first people’s photographic studios and began producing images of their fellow citizens.
Early in the 1960s, there were few photographers in Bamako—six at most. You would find them in the city’s poorer central neighborhoods (Madina Kura, Bamako Kura, Bagadadji, Dravela). Lively and warm, these districts of the capital were inhabited by carefree young people happy to be living in a society that had been launched on a path of high hopes. Every Malian believed that independence would bring about even more reasons to hope.
Adama Kouyaté, Le couple à moto, 1971.
Euphoria was permitted and prevalent. People celebrated and danced with joy at every occasion. Adults were working to build a society that promised prosperity; young people were bound by rigorous social and civic codes, yet at the same time encouraged to experience their age group’s pleasures. In clubs with unambiguous names like “The Friends,” “The Carefree,” “Beach Boys” and “Charming Ladies,” they dressed in the “Yé-yé” fashions shown in European celebrity magazines: bell-bottom pants, tight-fitting shirts and shoes of the darkest brown. They danced to American pop music. They swung to James Brown and Aretha Franklin.
The photographer was witness to and guardian of the happiness of a Bamakoan society that yearned for its image—the image of its new independence.
Adama Kouyaté, Joe Brin, 1967.
In the 1990s, a decade of renewed euphoria for Mali after 23 years of despotism, the West discovered and celebrated two men it considered—and still considers—the greatest photographers of the “dark continent”: Seydou Keïta and Malick Sidibé. The works of these two nearly retired Malian photographers became all the rage in galleries and museums in New York, Madrid, Barcelona, Paris and London.
Anonymous portrait galleries, joyful memories of a famous family, glowing faces from a day’s happiness—a thousand and one images resurfaced and began to circulate in the Western art market, which succumbed to their charms. Mali’s recent and tangible past was now being summoned before the spectators of Africa’s democratic renewal—as if the memory of the hopes that had been reclaimed from oblivion were coming to reassure the new hopes.
Thanks to the West’s infatuation with photographs produced in Africa in the mid-1950s, numerous African studio archives were unearthed, either by researchers driven by an anthropological approach or by curators of all stripes promoting a previously unknown African photography aesthetic. It was at this time that the name Adama Kouyaté finally surfaced, north of the Mediterranean and across the Atlantic.
Adama Kouyaté, Les minieuses, 1971.
Kouyaté was born in Bougouni and remained in this small southern Malian town until age 17. After his cobbler father died in 1944, Kouyaté found himself at the family’s helm. Without resources to provide for everyone’s needs, he decided to leave for Bamako, the capital, hoping to find work there. He began an internship with a master cobbler while waiting to find a better position.
On December 25, 1946, Kouyaté gave his girlfriend a Christmas present: he invited the photographer Bakary Doumbia to her house so that he could take their portrait. “The photo was so beautiful that I wanted to be a photographer myself,” Kouyaté says. “And I never let go of Bakary Doumbia again.” At the time, Doumbia and his brother Naby were two well-known and acclaimed Bamako photographers. Bakary ran the studio in the Dravela district and Naby was employed as a photographer with the National Police Force.
Kouyaté began an apprenticeship at Bakary Doumbia’s side. Very quickly, he familiarized himself with photography and its magic, also becoming acquainted with other photographers’ apprentices and the city’s studios. Finally, he met Pierre Garnier, the master teacher of all the city’s photographers, while admiring the images Garnier had taken and was exhibiting in the window of his “Photo Hall Soudanais.”
Adama Kouyaté, Les deux amies, 1971.
As a result of spending time at the Photo Hall Soudanais, Kouyaté was eventually hired by Garnier as his photo-enlarging assistant in 1947. Two years later, Kouyaté opened a studio in Kati, some nine miles from Bamako, and christened it “Photo Hall Kati.” Becoming a truck driver a few years later, he entrusted the studio to a young man he had trained, who managed the studio while Kouyaté was away. Over a period of ten years, Kouyate traveled all the roads in West Africa, staying in Lomé, Togo; Abidjan and Bouaké, Ivory Coast; and Ouagadougou, Burkina Faso. In Bouaké, a small trading town, he opened another studio, “Photo Hall Ivoire,” operating it until 1968, the year of the military coup in Mali. This event put an end to Kouyaté’s African adventure.
Back in Mali, investigating business opportunities and gathering information about the practice of photography, Kouyaté soon learned that Ségou’s Agence Nationale d’Animation (ANIM, or National Animation Agency)—which served as a photo studio, among other things—was about to close. No studio in town existed to replace it. Kouyaté knew the town of Ségou: in fact, he already owned a house there. An important city in the country, a trading crossroads counting several kings in its history, Ségou had a say in all of Mali’s national affairs. The great Bambara and Somono families kept a vigilant eye on local prosperity. Convinced of Ségou’s commercial opportunities, Kouyaté sold his car and, with the proceeds from the sale, set up a studio specializing in portraits called “Photo Hall d’Union,” in the Adama Seck building on Elhadj Oumar Tall Street, in the heart of the commercial district. The studio was inaugurated on September 22, 1969.
Adama Kouyaté, Mère fille, 1969.
For a long while, Adama Kouyaté remained the only photographer in town. On ordinary days, he was content with taking two rolls of 24 exposures each. In times of celebration—Tabaski (Eid al-Adha), Christmas, Ramadan, baptisms, weddings—he shot as many as six rolls per day. Other photographers eventually settled in Ségou, but Kouyaté never suffered from the competition. Women and young people, the majority of his clientele, always came to him to have their pictures taken.
Today, at the age of 82, Kouyaté continues to take picture IDs in his studio on Elhaj Omar Tall Street in Ségou.
Translated by Christine Schwartz-Hartley
Adama Kouyaté, Transistor, 1967.
Black Suede Gold ‘Martini’ coming soon at Barefoot Tess.
I know that black ballet flat is always considered as a wardrobe staple. But I wonder how many people would actually like to own a pair of this sparkling. I think most people would prefer to have the sparkling bow or glittering body on its own rather than both of them. Some people might consider it as being over the top.
As for me, I am more than happy to own a pair of studded ballerina flat ‘Martini’ by Jeffrey Campbell so that I could swap it with my plain black ballet flats. Although sequins suggest that these are meant to be for the evening, and they would make a great alternative to heels for a party, if you have issues with wearing high heels in general.
I would wear them in the daytime too and pair it with jeans or simple skirt. The price is still unknown and would be available at some point in June 2013.
Available from June 2013 from Barefoot Tess.
Cold Feet by Jeffrey Campbell is of the new designs that will soon be on sale at Barefoot Tess.
Daisy Lita Silver Right comes in US Size 11 to 14. Typically, I would have said that these funky looking ankle boots is obviously suited for edgy dressing – which it is.
But have you thought about wearing this as your bridal shoes? I think it is ideal for the independent bride that is not really keen on the traditional wedding shoes but would prefer edgy shoes with no fuss.
These days some people are getting married in usual places such as backyards, urban gardens, on beaches and mountain sides and in the pub and may be such an unusual wedding shoe collection is what women with such mind actually needs.
So I guess the next question I would ask you is – would you choose to wear these shoes as a bridal shoes?
MUMBAI: Well sometimes it not about style and grace. It’s just about getting it right. But how can some women in Bollywood get it wrong?
Not So Hawa Hawai – Vidya Balan, who was there at the music launch of ‘Ghanchakkar’ was seen in blue jeans and a white t-shirt with multi fluorescent coloured sleeves. It read ‘Hawa Hawai’. Well not cool at all. Also the blue flowery shoes, seemed like borrowed from a teenager’s wardrobe. Vidya Balan seems to have gone ‘Ghanchakkar’ with her style. Is it intentional?
Raveena Tandon might have sizzled in the songs of the 90’s with the silk sarees. But this silken white top and brown silken trousers does seem an odd combination. The top, seem to have been designed from an extra silken bed sheet. Quite a letdown to see Raveena Tandon rather thanda, when the other ladies of her age are gracefully carrying their outfits.
Huma Qureshi was spotted at Karan Johar’s birthday party in a rich white top and a multi fluorescent coloured skirt, which did nothing for her figure.
In another birthday Kareena Kapoor was seen wearing a flashy fluorescent orange innerwear, which grabbed eyeballs. The multi coloured fluorescent pink skirt did not do much good to her rather embarrassing outfit for a birthday party. And the sunglasses at night were inexplicable.
NICOLI – Love to Sparkle? Competition on Facebook – www.facebook.com/nicolishoes
LOVE TO SPARKLE? HERE’S YOUR CHANCE TO WIN ONE OF 12 LUXURY CRYSTAL EMBELLISHED SHOES AND/OR HANDBAGS FROM NICOLI ON FACEBOOK.COM/NICOLISHOES
Dubai, United Arab Emirates (PRWEB) June 03, 2013
Renowned worldwide for its fashion authority, Italian craftsmanship, Arabian elegance and unmatched quality; few fashion houses can boast as much mystique as NICOLI. The glamorous world of NICOLI is not just exclusive, it is elegant, unique and highly sought after too. Created as the perfect accessory to life’s most beautiful and memorable moments, Hollywood glamour and Italian styling is behind, and can be seen in everything NICOLI does; from the exquisite hand crafted evening handbags, purses and clutches to the glamorous Swarovski diamanté embellished shoes.
To celebrate and strengthen the bond with their valued clientele, NICOLI is proud to announce the launch of their first ever Facebook competition; ‘Love to Sparkle?’ “The competition is not only a way to celebrate the 1st Birthday of our Mirdif City Centre Boutique, but is way to thank all those amazing fashionistas out there who continue to support us throughout the GCC and online.” – Kate Weaver, Marketing and Business Development Director, NICOLI
The competition will run for a month and lucky entrants will get the chance to win one of 12 fabulous, crystal embellished handbags and/or pairs of shoes – one product for each month the boutique has been open.
To enter the “Love to Sparkle?” competition is a piece of cake. Users simply Like the NICOLI Facebook page, click the enter competition button, then ‘LOVE’ their favorite NICOLI shoe or handbag – it’s that easy. The more times a person loves their favorite product and shares the Love to Sparkle? promotion, the more chances they will have to win! Winners will be notified via email and products they have won will be shipped to them. Furthermore, the worldwide NICOLI – Love to Sparkle? promotion might just become a permanent monthly fixture for the brand on Facebook, thus, giving every shoe and handbag aficionado a chance to shine in NICOLI’s luxurious crystal embellished products for free!
Whether it’s their stunning boutiques, online flagship boutique or Facebook giveaways / competitions, NICOLI has always attracted a unique and sohisticated clientele by offering them a complete NICOLI lifestyle. The beautiful, limited edition crystal embellished collection of ladies’ shoes and handbags includes it all – from futuristic styles to retro give-aways and sorbet tones to earthy appeal – from gorgeous siren heels to cutting edge wedges, sparkling flats and more. The flairs and designs are an eclectic mix of dazzling metallic tones and consider the instincts and everyday needs of a practical life from crystal embellished stiletto heels to ballerinas, comfort slip-ons that transition from day to night, to a stunning array of unique limited edition must-haves.
Steeped in glamor and famed for fashionable yet timeless products, NICOLI continues to explore new grounds to reach its clientele even more conveniently. With the recent opening of a new flagship boutique at Al-Ain Mall, NICOLI stores have now reached the total number of seven throughout the GCC. In addition, NICOLI has recently launched their online ecommerce boutique – http://www.nicolishoes.com
With the NICOLI – Love to Sparkle? competition on Facebook, NICOLI is all set to tempt its customers’ toes into something fashionably fabulous! This superb Love to Sparkle? competition is available to NICOLI fans worldwide and anyone can enter by simply liking the NICOLI page and selecting their favorite NICOLI products on Facebook. It’s that simple! Just remember, participation is key – for a chance to win these luxurious crystal embellished shoes and handbags.
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New Babydoll Dresses Just Released By TideBuy.com For Summer 2013
PRWEB.COM Newswire
(PRWEB) June 02, 2013
TideBuy.com, the world’s renowned online store of women’s dresses, has just released its new collection of babydoll dresses, and these new products come with a whopping discount of 65%-80% off. According to Edmond Liu, a senior spokesman for the company, the special offer will end at the end of this month.
Babydoll dresses have been very popular among young ladies. TideBuy.com has studied the baby doll dress market carefully, and the new baby dolldresses are specially designed for the young girls who love fashion. TideBuy.com ensures that all its products are made with top-quality materials and dedicate craftsmanship.
“We are excited to introduce our new products to ladies worldwide. Here, low prices never mean low quality. I can say, 50 years later, our babydoll dresses are still fashionable. Enjoy the freedom of wearing a babydoll dress!” says, Edmond Liu. “Now, we have also come up with great offers like discounts and free shipping for our customers worldwide.”
Edmond Liu continues, “At TideBuy.com, we cater to different requirements with our trendy products. Whether you’re planning an evening or daytime party, you’ll find a proper style at TideBuy.com.
About TideBuy.com
Based in Beijing, China, TideBuy.com is leading online store, offering extensive and trendy collections of black bridesmaid dresses, long sleeve wedding dresses, shoes, bags, and many more at acceptable low prices. The company has promised to provide their own wedding dresses without sacrificing the top-quality materials and fast delivery.
More information can be found at: http://www.tidebuy.com/
Read the full story at http://www.prweb.com/releases/2013/6/prweb10792797.htm
02 JUNE 2013
Kate Middleton makes style waves every time she and her baby bump emerge from the Palace gates and this commitment to fashion‘s cause hasn‘t escaped Holly Valance‘s eagle eye. The former Strictly Come Dancing star told HELLO! online: “Kate Middleton has the hardest job in the world, she sets a great example for young girls. She’s conservative, modern, elegant and feminine all at the same time.”
Although if could exchange any style tips with the Duchess if would involve upping the ante just a touch, Holly added: “If I’m honest I want her to look like a princess and if she’s wearing clothes from the high street I don’t find it endearing, I want her to be mega like all the [other] princesses around the world.”
Holly Valance
While the Australian, who has a starring role on the judging panel of hot new fashion show, Ultimate Shopper, may prefer to see royalty in garments with a three-figure plus price tag she did continue her admiration for the future queen’s style prowess telling HELLO! online: “I like that she wears local designers I think that’s really patriotic of her and cool, she is a brilliant ambassador for this country!”
In the show that will make its UK debut on TLC Holly plays her part as the sharp tongued critic with a penchant for cutting comments. She also adds humourous honesty that is complemented by fellow judges Brix Smith-Smart and Jason Gardiner. Along with a guest judge the trio task three ladies with a challenge to dress for such as a job interview or afternoon tea, the contestants then have just 20 minutes to find an outfit in the show’s shop as they battle it out to be crowned the ‘ultimate shopper’.
Kate Middleton wearing a Topshop dress
And no one is safe from their style slamming, not even the Duchess of Cambridge, as Holly’s colleagues joined in on the critique with Brix Smith-Smart revealing she believes the mother-to-be is ageing herself.
“Kate Middleton has a hard line to walk because of all the attention there was on Diana’s fashion,” Brix said. “She’s always respectful but I think she dresses a little too old – she’s playing it very safe but I don’t think she’s put a foot wrong. I’d love to see her have more fun with fashion!”
Jason Gardiner who found fame with his no-holds-barred judging style during Dancing On Ice joined in on things adding: “Kate is a very beautiful girl, but what is she doing with those shoes?” His partner in critiquing crime, Holly, couldn’t contain a laugh at this point, which prompted Jason to continue with: “Those horrible black shoes, they look like the Queen told her to put them on.”
Holly and her husband, Nick Candy, and her Ultimate Shopper co-star, Brix Smith-Smart
To provide the perfect balance, required of any reality TV show guest judge, Italian fashion expert, Carla Gozzi proved that whatever your opinion of Kate Middleton’s wardrobe choices, you can’t fault her influence…
“In Italy Kate is loved,” Carla revealed. “She’s an inspiration for young girls because she started to wear these nude tights everyone in Italy is wearing them now, they are a big hit.”
And with a colourful and sometimes chaotic collection of judges The Ultimate Shopper is set to be a hit too!
The Ultimate Shopper premieres at 9pm on 6 June on TLC
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Jun
01
Posted by : | On : June 1, 2013
Monitor Photo/Robyn Wheeler
Cedar Creek Lake Women’s Club members (from left) Rosalee Randall, Barbara Love, Kayla Jordan, Jean Bothe, Carol Price and Betty Paschall, model summer ensembles from Beall’s at the last meeting of the season. The ladies donned brand-name jewelry, handbags and shoes to go with evening, sports and leisure wear.
Women’s Club members recognized with awards
By Robyn Wheeler
Monitor Staff Writer
GUN BARREL CITY–The Cedar Creek Lake Women’s Club celebrated the last meeting of the club year with a fashion show and member recognition awards.
The Cedar Creek County Club, the clubs normal venue, was closed for the Memorial Day holiday, so Vetoni’s Italian Restaurant owner Mike Lowther was pleased to offer the use his restaurant for the gathering.
Lowther began the festivities by giving away prizes to three lucky ladies, each being able to choose between a plant, a wall decoration and a Vetoni’s dinner for two adults and two kids.
The ladies were then treated to a Beall’s fashion show, where six club members modeled summer evening, formal and casual wear for women.
CCLWC member Kayla Jordan was honored to model Beall’s new tennis wear and accessories they now display in the store.
The ladies also enjoyed fresh salad, chicken florentine and seafood parmasean, bread and ice tea for lunch.
Afterwards, the clubs phone callers were recognized, each receiving a gift bag, for donating their time and dedication throughout the year.
Club member Lynda Bruner was honored to install the 2013-14 officers, who included:
• treasurer Linda Gallatin,
• secretary Donna Bickerstaff,
• first vice president Phyllis Watson,
• second vice president Susan Thomas, and
• president Cindy Beck.
In other news, club members heard:
• the clubs food drive raised $1,377 and was distributed evenly among the four food banks in the area.
• the club is now on summer break and will resume meetings in September.
More photos from this event can be found in the Sunday, June 2, 2013 issue of The Monitor.
There are dresses that wear the woman—think of Jennifer Lawrence struggling in an outsized Dior gown at the Oscars—and then there are women who wear dresses. Queen Elizabeth II fall into the latter category. She’s never totally au courant but never totally out of vogue. Rather she’s adopted a uniform that works for her: a bright coat and matching hat, accessorized with pearls, a glittering brooch, gloves and plain shoes and purse. For big formal events, she pulls out all the stops, starting with a tiara and spectacular gems.
But on June 2, 1953 for her coronation, the Queen turned to master couturier Norman Hartnell to create what is certainly the most perfect dress she’s ever worn. Only Hartnell could have dreamed it up. Only she could have carried it off. He spent months researching the topic, and produced nearly a dozen sketches before finalizing the design. The white silk dress, heavily embroidered with the emblems of England, Scotland, Wales and Ireland as well as Commonwealth countries like Canada (yup, there are maple leafs on it), served to emphasize the responsibility being placed onto the then-26-year-old monarch. Made of English silk with a sweetheart neckline and short sleeves, it was so heavy that three layers of horsehair were used, so as to lighten it enough that the Queen could move freely through the complicated manoeuvres in Westminster Abbey. It was delivered to Buckingham Palace days before the big event. (The Royal Order of Sartorial Splendor has a lovely piece on the dress.)
The Telegraph has rare coloured film from the event which shows off the dress:
Interestingly, that wasn’t the only time the dress would be worn by the Queen, including the opening of Parliaments in New Zealand, Australia and Canada in 1957. This summer, Buckingham Palace’s exhibition will focus on the events of 60 years ago, especially the outfits. And the highlight will be her coronation dress.
Hartnell’s influence didn’t end there. As the Royal Collection says, “Norman Hartnell (1901-79) was responsible for designing The Queen’s Coronation Dress and Robe, the dresses worn by all the principal ladies of the immediate Royal Family, including Queen Elizabeth The Queen Mother, and the outfits for the Maids of Honour. Hartnell’s influence on Coronation Day also extended to the outfits worn by the peeresses. According to the Earl Marshal’s orders, peeresses were expected to wear Robes of State and coronets according to their rank, together with kirtles and coronation dress. Those who were not in possession of this attire, and who were below the rank of countess, could wear alternative robes and dress. Hartnell submitted designs for both alternative dress and head coverings, as his original watercolour and pencil sketches in exhibition show.”
Hartnell, who died in 1979, is known primarily for designing the Queen’s wedding dress and then her coronation dress. But he was also instrumental in establishing London as a leading fashion centre. As Linda Grant stated in the Telegraph, “Hartnell not only designed one of the most important dresses of the 20th century, the Queen’s coronation outfit, but was single-handedly responsible for turning London into a design centre, if not to rival Paris, at least to challenge its sole, overwhelming supremacy. For until Hartnell, British designers such as Charles Worth and Edward Molyneux either moved their operations to Paris, or stayed at home and focused on what even the French grudgingly acknowledged the English were renowned for: tailoring, particularly the tweed day suit so essential in draughty, damp English country houses. There was no British couture and, if you wanted to dress well, you had to cross the Channel.”
Buckingham Palace’s state rooms will be open from July 27 to Sept. 29. Tickets are on sale now. If you’re still deciding between London or another destination, then chose the former. This is one fashion exhibit that is unlikely to be seen again in a very, very long time.
