Sanlé Sory
Yamaha de nuit

Yamaha de nuit

© Sanlé Sory, Courtesy of the artist and Yossi Milo, New York

Yamaha de nuit
Yamaha de nuit
ArtistBurkinabé, born 1943
CultureBurkinabé
Titles
  • Yamaha de nuit
  • Nighttime Yamaha
Date1972, printed 2017
MediumGelatin silver print
DimensionsImage: 14 × 14 1/8 in. (35.5 × 35.9 cm)
Sheet: 19 13/16 × 15 15/16 in. (50.3 × 40.5 cm)
Credit LineMuseum purchase funded by Joan Morgenstern in memory of Bruce Daniel
Object number2019.62
Not on view

Explore Further

Department
Photography
Object Type
DescriptionIn the late 1950s, just months before French-controlled Upper Volta would become the independent country of Burkina Faso, Sanlé Sory opened a studio with little more than a few hand-painted backdrops, a camera, and a creative mind. Each person’s turn in the studio was a cinematic event. They were pictured as if in a fantasy—taking off on an adventure, or driving a sleek motorcycle. “I had things I took out when people asked,” Sory said. “The motorbike, the flowerpot, the telephone, the radio.” For the artist, a portrait was a chance for people “to escape their ordinary lives.”
ProvenanceThe artist, Bobo-Dioulasso, Burkina Faso; [Yossi Milo Gallery, New York]; purchased by MFAH, 2019.
Exhibition History"Through an African Lens: Sub-Saharan Photography from the Museum's Collection," Museum of Fine Arts, Houston, February 27–November 8, 2020.
Inscriptions, Signatures and Marks
Signed in pencil, verso, bottom right: SoRy [sic] Sanle 2017 // YAMAHA DE NUIT, 1972 /2017 // 6/15
Signed in pencil, verso, bottom right: SoRy [sic] Sanle 2017 // YAMAHA DE NUIT, 1972 /2017 // 6/15

Cataloguing data may change with further research.

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no date
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1927
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c. 1930
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c. 1930
Glass, cardboard, and thread
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