Multidisciplinary artist Souleymane Bachir Diaw is examining the complex rituals of manhood, memory, and transformation in his latest photographic project, Sutura. The solo exhibition, presented as part of the 2026 Louis Roederer Foundation Discovery award, is currently on display at Les Rencontres d’Arles festival and will run until 4 October.
Diaw’s work utilizes photography, installation, sound, and research to interrogate how patriarchal structures are inscribed upon the body. Through a series of carefully composed images featuring textiles such as grand boubous, hijabs, and rabal cloths, the artist deconstructs traditional notions of authority, dignity, and gender roles.
At the beginning of the project, Diaw created a self-portrait titled Self-Portrait Resting on Rabbal, Earth Tone (2021), in which he curls over a pillow, withdrawn from the expected demands of male strength and vigilance. In this image, vulnerability is presented not as a weakness but as a necessary condition for repair. This theme of intimacy and nourishment continues in Self-Portrait, Hand on Arrow on Rabbal (2021), where millet, textile, and the human body converge in a gesture that allows vulnerability to rest without discipline.
The exhibition also addresses the social construction of masculinity. White Cotton Headpieces on Clothes Line (2022) depicts a row of headpieces in a domestic courtyard, evoking absent boys and the ritual passages toward manhood. The work critiques how ideas of discipline and endurance are imposed on the body before they can be fully understood. In Worn Striped Olive-Green Jam-Puut and White Cotton Headpiece, the face is obscured, shifting the focus from individual identity to the prescribed roles one enters during these rites of passage.
Garments in the Grey Area series further explore the fluidity of clothing across genders. In Worn White Grand Boubou with Gold Embroidery and Green Headscarf (2022), the grand boubou confers dignity and authority, while the headscarf removes facial visibility. Diaw suggests that beauty acts as both an opening and a screen, capable of carrying silence and concealed violence. Similarly, Worn Light Green Jam-puut merges garment and figure, using elegance to create a commanding presence that highlights the violence often hidden behind beauty and authority.
The domestic sphere serves as a critical backdrop for examining gender dynamics. Worn Light Blue Lace Boubou and Striped White Jam-puut (2021) shows one figure leaving while another remains, represented only by garments draped over a chair. The image considers how patriarchal masculinity can frame withdrawal as a position of authority, leaving silence and care to be borne by those who stay.
In the Blue Note series, Worn Navy Blue Hijab (2022) features a face with closed eyes suspended between concealment and comfort. The work offers masculinity a space for calm and vulnerability, questioning why the labor of emotional shelter is often assigned to feminized bodies.
Diaw also utilizes everyday objects to reveal deeper meanings. Rabal and Threads Wrapping Scissors (2021) places scissors wrapped in cloth between concealment and transformation, allowing familiar items to drift from their assigned uses. Meanwhile, Diég Ñáata? (2022), part of the Red Line series, places a fish bone across a tin of tomato paste. The Wolof expression translates to a woman of value, prompting questions about how worth is measured and at whose expense intimacy and hospitality are produced.
The concept of performance is central to Performing the Transmission (2025). Holding a family photograph, Diaw stages an attempt to embody the archive. Surrounding him are a prayer rug, lace tablecloth, belt, and ties, turning the domestic interior into a space where memory, faith, and patriarchal masculinity are passed down through objects and gestures. By exposing the construction of the scene, the work reveals identity as something assembled, inherited, and continually performed.
The Black Belt series confronts the mechanics of restraint and control. In Self-Portrait in a Black Suit and Brown Silky Fabric (2025), the figure appears to be silencing itself, illustrating how masculinity is sustained through self-surveillance and fear. Self-Portrait in Black Tank Top and Brown Leather Belt (2025) depicts a body pulled inward by a belt, with hands embracing the tension. Set against the memory of domestic violence, the gesture recalls forms of care learned through others rather than solitary repair. Finally, Self-Portrait in Black Suit Pants and Brown Leather Belt (2025) shows the body losing balance as the belt tightens around the leg, revealing how patriarchal masculinity is carried through the restraints and instabilities imposed on the body.
Is this exhibition actually accessible to the public, or just another academic exercise for the elite art crowd?
Finally, art that dares to show vulnerability without shame. Diaw challenges toxic masculinity beautifully.