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As a gift upon graduating high school, I was sent to Kenya on an Ouward Bound course to climb Mt Kilimanjaro. An extraordinary climb to the top of Africa, we had the opportunity to ascend on the Tanzanian side of the mountain, where we had the landscape to ourselves. Part of the journey included a visit to a Masai village, where I found and painted this pair of traditionally dressed tribal members in the company of Kenyan students in modern dress. Appearing ghost-like, as if fading into the background, the works question the stability of the nomadic cultures that call the Savannah home.
Employed by Botswana’s government to help assess diamond count in an attempt to quell the illicit funding of war in the greater region, our friend Christopher Campbell had the opportunity to spend some years in Botswana with his family. We visited in the summer after my high school graduation and took a road trip around the central region of southern Africa. A highlight was flying into the Okavango Delta to float around by dugout canoe as we sought out the copious amounts of wildlife. This is a series of portraits of our worthy guides, Ra Simone, Ra B and ‘Shorty’, who kept us from being eaten by lions or crocodiles. At one point during the week, we came across a fresh lion kill. Shorty helped himself to a hearty piece of meat while we edged away, nervous that the lion may be very close by since our guides seemed to think we had frightened him off (!!) For the next few days, the meat simmered over the campfire, feeding the guides with a hearty stew to accompany their feff. These works are oil on paper, 4″x5″ each