Thursday, November 19, 2009

Awe-Inspiring Photography

Sometimes I have these moments where I realize that I am really lucky. Maybe lucky isn't the correct word. Sheltered. No. Modernized. Yes. Boring. Kind of. Where am I going with this?

I love watching Art Wolfe's Travels to the Edge on PBS. He goes to these amazing places and takes these amazing photographs.



Today, I caught the "Ethiopia: The Omo Valley" episode. He traveled to some of the most remote country in the entire world. The lives of the villagers that he visited are so completely non-Westernized that it was said that the people in one tribe did not even know that they lived in a country called Ethiopia. It was truly amazing to see cultures so unlike mine. So primitive. So pure. So uncluttered. Where it warrants an elaborate celebration for a successful harvest season. Where men from different villages still battle each other for the hearts of the women.

Art said that he was not there to document the cultures like many photographers or anthropologists do but rather to document the artful body painting, body adornments and ceremonies. He made mention that these tribes have no museums or galleries or even living rooms to hang art, but it is on their persons that they derive art and culture. I don't know why this struck me as so powerful, but it did.


The cultures are truly beautiful in my eyes. It's that they know nothing different. And, it seems, if they do know different, they choose to live the way their ancestors have for thousands of years. Incredible. Interesting. Beautiful.

If you haven't seen Art Wolfe's show, you should.

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