Daouda Keïta

Daouda Keïta is the Executive Director of the Musée national du Mali in Bamako, Mali’s national museum of archaeological and ethnographic collections and contemporary art. An archeologist and professor at the Université des Sciences Sociales et de Gestion de Bamako, he has dedicated his work to defend cultural heritage by forming partnerships with local communities and creating educational platforms to combat the looting of archeological sites and trafficking of artifacts. He was, for example, one of the co-founders of the “banques culturelles,” local institutions created across Mali as village museums, to provide communities with economic, social and educational opportunities through culture, aiming to address the dynamics that lead to the sale of cultural objects and to develop a sense of community ownership of archeological sites and cultural heritage to act against looting. Keïta’s vision for the Musée national du Mali is to create an open space for exchange that benefits Malian culture.