Sory Sanlé and the "People of the Night"

"Photography is a witness to everything, a kind of proof of life. When I started out, my nation was a French colony. A few months after, in 1958, we became an independent colony. Two years later, we were fully independent. Haute-Volta, as the country was known before 1983, flourished after independence, and the region experienced its own nouvelle vague."
Sory Sanlé

"There were only a few photographers working in Haute-Volta at the time. Most were in Ouagadougou, the capital. I was one of the first in Bobo, and the first to use the name Volta. People were excited about the possibilities independence offered and played with new identities in the studio."
Sory Sanlé

Sory Sanlé is a Burkinabe photographer, born in 1943, who developed "a reputation as photographer of the Burkinabe club scene in the 1960s and 70s" (via). Burkina Faso's club scene was vibrant in the years after the independence from France, bands played to "stylish crowds riding a wave of liberation". And Sanlé captured it all. (via)

“It was a pleasure to show the joy of those people. People loved each other and there was so much fun. … They might have been poor but they had a ball and enjoyed those moments.”
Sory Sanlé

“It did not matter what anyone’s position was,” says Sory. “People would always mingle, interact and take care of each other — not like today.”
Sory Sanlé

photographs via and via and via