In Burkina Faso, tragic events (sudden death, illness, accident...) or out-of-the-ordinary occurrences are inevitably interpreted as the result of malicious intervention. There must be someone to blame. Having grown up in this culture, Adrien Bitibaly was able to observe from an early age the importance of traditional religions in Burkinabe society. Among the manifestations of these beliefs, accusations of witchcraft have always caught his attention. As a child, the objects or places he was told were possessed or haunted seemed quite ordinary to him, and he never understood what could generate such denunciations. Witchcraft remains elusive, supernatural and unverifiable. Yet the consequences of an accusation are very real: the inequalities and discrimination suffered by the accused (as these accusations overwhelmingly affect women) are legion.
As an adult, with Quatre Yeux, Adrien Bitibaly travelled the country to meet traditional priests, individuals endowed with the “capacity” to determine whether a person possesses evil powers and should therefore be designated as a witch. What is their role in this social practice? Possessors of a power whose conditions of exercise remain unknown to the majority, can they be wrong? His photographic work seeks to show what can trigger accusations of witchcraft. His aim is to explore the genesis of popular belief, not to prove a truth.