This essay focuses on the story of Seydou Keïta (1921/1923–2001), a neighbourhood photographer in Bamako in the 1950s, whose archives have become the “jewel in the crown” of a private collection of contemporary African art. The author questions the gaps and inconsistencies in the photographer’s biography, which has been rewritten several times since 1994. Paradoxically the several thousand images making up the Seydou Keïta collection – an essential piece of the jigsaw puzzle of Mali’s photographic history – remain unknown to researchers and to Malians generally, who have only virtual and partial access to this visual heritage totally reconfigured for the needs of the art market. This essay emphasises the need for alternative modes of dissemination for the Seydou Keïta collection, in particular via digitisation, which would allow it to be “re-contextualised” from within Bamako, and would provide new ways of seeing through photography.