Le voyageur

A plaid suitcase stamped Air Afrique in hand, dark suit, white pocket square, pen in the breast pocket: the young man meets the lens with the assurance of someone about to leave. He is going nowhere: the case belongs to the Volta Photo studio, a prop lent to anyone dreaming of the jet age. On the checkerboard floor of Bobo-Dioulasso, before a plain hanging sheet, Sanlé Sory composes full frame on his Rolleiflex 6×6 one of the defining portraits of his generation.

Print 7 of a limited edition of 8: a digigraphie on Hahnemühle Photo Rag Baryta 315 g paper, image 36 × 36 cm, museum frame, museum glass. A classic of african photography, this black and white print belongs to a body of work held at MoMA, the Art Institute of Chicago, the V&A and LACMA. Le voyageur is on view in Generation Volta at Sakana Gallery, Donostia, until 1 October 2026.

Print details

• Edition : 7/8
• Image : 36 × 36 cm
• Paper : 40 × 50 cm
• Technique : Digigraphie print on Hahnemühle Photo Rag Baryta 315 g paper
• Framing : Museum framing, museum glass

An Air Afrique suitcase and a pressed suit: the studio stages a dreamed departure. A print of this image is held by the Museum of Modern Art in New York, a measure of the place Sanlé Sory now holds in the history of African photography. Rediscovered in 2011 by Florent Mazzoleni, he was given his first solo museum show in the United States at the Art Institute of Chicago in 2018. Bobo-Dioulasso studio photography has entered the great collections.

All works by Sanlé Sory · Exhibition catalogue (PDF)