elegance in the thick of it ~ South Sudan: The World's Newest Nation

(Steve Evans, photographer, click on image for link to Life Force Magazine, where I found this image)

How elegant is this beautiful woman from South Sudan?! Even though she's standing in front of a war machine, she holds her own in her beautiful subtle coloured drapery. The combination of prints, which

look like indigenous traditional patterns (but I don't know that for sure), the way she is standing, so feminine and graceful..

And there she is standing in front of the brutish looking tank, on dusty dry ground, probably barefoot (but I don't know that for sure either). Inspiring...

Herb Ritts just about defined the nineties

I read somewhere that Herb Ritts just about defined the nineties, and I agree. His images often pushed right to the edge of what we define as beauty and plain raw ugliness. I have his book called 'Africa' in which he photographs the tallest most exquisitely graceful people on the planet as well as rotting animal corpses in the desert. Somehow one still thinks of him as a fashion photographer, I think its because the images are so direct and resonant of the moment.