a friend of the Tamasheq...

...Patricia Sorbier (Aix-en-Provence, France) contacted me several days ago to say that one of the photographs from ABIS's 2007 Expedition to the Sahel had inspired her most recent pastel. Any friend of the Tamasheq is a friend of mine. Also she just happened to choose one of my very favorite photographs. It is hard to put a label...was she an 'old woman', an 'elderly woman', a 'matriarch of a clan'? For me she was at once each of these and also something more...something elemental, primordial. Such humans exist in every culture. Al hamdullilah. She was in the encampement from which I was gifted Aisinda.

Thank you to Patricia for sharing these photographs with me. Here is a link to her online gallery. Proceeds from the sale of her artwork go to purchase goats (milking does) for Tamasheq families.