IDOL

Idol is a photographic series by Malick Welli that centers the visual representation of Black Muslim identity within a framework of spiritual inheritance, cultural affirmation, and historical continuity. Composed of large-format monochromatic portraits, the series engages with the complexity of Blackness in Islamic contexts—both as lived experience and as political imagination.

Rather than idealizing or romanticizing its subjects, Idol positions them as figures of reverence grounded in real cultural and spiritual traditions. The title challenges the tension between religious iconoclasm and the need for representation, particularly in Islamic societies where imagery is often contested. Through this provocation, Welli opens space to reflect on who is permitted to be seen as sacred, and under what conditions.

The visual language of the series draws from a range of iconographic references: Bilal ibn Rabah, the Abyssinian companion of the Prophet Muhammad and the first muezzin; Malcolm X, whose image continues to symbolize political clarity and religious conviction in the Black diaspora; and the Senegalese tradition of portraying marabouts in devotional, domestic, and public spaces. These figures are not represented directly, but rather evoked through posture, dress, and symbolic cues—allowing the portraits to function simultaneously as portraits and as visual theologies.