We weren't sure what to think when we first flipped through Natural Fashion, a gorgeously photographed chronicle of the nomadic people of Ethoiopia's Omo Valley. Page after page of young, naked, painted African models, wearing towering headdresses of leaves, vines and flowers. Who would dare to put together a project like this?


It turns out that the members of the Surma and Mursi tribes design these amazing items themselves. It's not some "project", it's their way of life.

Hans Silvester is the photographer who captured the ephemeral beauty of the nomads' self adornment practices, which incorporate highly detailed decorative body painting with almost anything else they find along the river where they live.

Other than a few pages of background information at the beginning, the book is comprised entirely of stunning portraits of the people of the Omo tribes -- Silvester doesn't even include captions. Instead, the photos speak for themselves, demonstrating the inventiveness and grace of the subjects.

The book is particularly timely because the isolation that created and preserved this artistic exploration is increasingly threatened by contact with "modern" cultures. Ironically, tourists come to see the "natural" nomads, bringing money, liquor and weapons, and planting the seeds of destruction for the Omo tribes' traditional way of life.

Natural Fashion, published by Thames & Hudson, may soon be a record of lost culture, as well as a celebration of the stirring artistic talent of the Surma and Mursi people.