Piazza Spagna 2019

I very often like to stop this type of images that look like a theater in the square in the street, without anyone in place by following the different movements of my shot, through the different realities that make, people in that place, in that movement, with palaces and squares, telling us realities.

Mohamed Keita

Born in the Ivory Coast in 1993, Keita found that he had to flee his country at the age of fourteen because of the civil war. He started a three year journey across Guinea, Mali, Algeria, Libya and Malta to finally arrive in Italy in 2010 at the age of seventeen.

Welcomed into a youth centre for refugees in Rome, Civico Zero, Keita learnt Italian, whilst he worked as a porter in a hotel. Thanks to his time at Civico Zero he discovered that he had an innate vocation for photography and thus began his artistic career. Thus, Keita enrolled himself at the Institute of Cinema and TV Roberto Rossellini.

For Keita, photography is a means of sharing, not just the artistic form but also memories of the past, describing the present and the encapsulation of the city and daily life, continuous change at times imperceptible. Today, Keita lives and works in Rome where he follows the young photographers of Civico Zero.

In 2017, Keita assisted in setting up two laboratories of photography for the children living in the outskirts of Bamako, Mali and Nairobi, Kenya on which he continues to work. The Pecci Museum in Prato, the Photolux Festival in Lucca, the 13th International Festival of Rome held in the MACRO Museum are amongst the most important institutions with which Keita has collaborated through workshops and/or exhibitions.

On Artvocate, Keita showcases eight photographs: four from Africa and four from Europe. These shots exhibit the artist's geographical movement now as a prolific photographer, while calling back to his past experiences of movement as a refugee. They map the hybrid identities and transference of cultural and social environments that refugees face in their displacement.

Based on our agreement with the artist, 15% of the pre-VAT price excluding frames will be donated to support the CivicoZero Onlus.