Sheila Metzner

Samburu Portrait. Kenya

1997

This photograph is signed by the photographer and is printed using the Fresson printing process. Size varies.

This photograph is signed by the photographer and is printed using the Fresson printing process. Size varies.

This photograph is signed by the photographer and is printed using the Fresson printing process. Size varies.

Signed by the photographer

I met this young married Samburu in the middle of a busy market in western Kenya. She was with a group of young women browsing the wooden stalls dotted across the dusty red earth in the lowlands of the Matthew’s Range. In Samburu communities young men spend years as warriors – a wandering lifestyle which make it impossible for them to marry. Instead they take girlfriends and give them beads and necklaces to indicate their relationship. Samburu girls adore receiving these presents and adorn themselves in more and more necklaces. The girl in this picture, although now married to an elder, still shows her beads from the time of being promised to a warrior: they are the band of 8 or so thin necklaces...

I met this young married Samburu in the middle of a busy market in western Kenya. She was with a group of young women browsing the wooden stalls dotted across the dusty red earth in the lowlands of the Matthew’s Range. In Samburu communities young men spend years as warriors – a wandering lifestyle which make it impossible for them to marry. Instead they take girlfriends and give them beads and necklaces to indicate their relationship. Samburu girls adore receiving these presents and adorn themselves in more and more necklaces. The girl in this picture, although now married to an elder, still shows her beads from the time of being promised to a warrior: they are the band of 8 or so thin necklaces...

I met this young married Samburu in the middle of a busy market in western Kenya. She was with a group of young women browsing the wooden stalls dotted across the dusty red earth in the lowlands of the Matthew’s Range. In Samburu communities young men spend years as warriors – a wandering lifestyle which make it impossible for them to marry. Instead they take girlfriends and give them beads and necklaces to indicate their relationship. Samburu girls adore receiving these presents and adorn themselves in more and more necklaces. The girl in this picture, although now married to an elder, still shows her beads from the time of being promised to a warrior: they are the band of 8 or so thin necklaces...

"XVII 220 - Lelesas, Louelen, Lewangu, Lepokodou, Loingu, Nyerere - Ndoto Mountain Range - Kenya, 2010 The Samburu live in northern Kenya, where the Ndoto mountains give way towards...