Bashagi Mines: Dusk

Near Kibish in Southern Ethiopia, the Bashagi gold mines attract young female members of the Suri people, who hike an unpaved field road for two days to a small, living station. There they stay for up to ten days, working long hours, digging and panning for gold. These women see the experience at the gold mines as an adventure, but primarily it is an opportunity to earn money to buy seed, or possibly a cow, thereby increasing the value of their marriage dowry when they return home. Through pattern, color and imagery, my intent is to express the vibrancy and beauty in the determined faces of these Suri women, who toil in the dry, arid heat from early dawn, until the setting of the African sun, with the specific goal of attracting a more desirable future husband with their earnings. (Original images courtesy Dietmar Temps, Cologne, Germany, with permission.)