With 60 big prints (40x50 cm) and a hundred small-sized ones arranged next to each other on a wall, Sergio Caminata tells us about the Himba, Nomads of the north-western Namibia.

Caminata has lived with them for a month in the Kaokoland, barren, harsh land of an uncontaminated beauty. Between the Kaokoland and the sea is the Namib, the oldest desert in the world, which has protected the Himba from the whites for centuries. In such an inhospitable land the Himba live in small groups amidst springs scattered in that wide territory travelling with their cattle. Today there are approximately 7,000 Himbas, who are still nomadic shepherds, in spite of external pressures put on them by missionaries and schools and in spite of the intrusiveness of the "big market". Caminata watched at them, getting familiar with their habits and customs.

The beauty of the Himba - what we regard as beauty - as Levi Strauss had already understood of other native populations, is in their considering the body a face. The body is so much a support, like the paper on which their culture is written as to become essential, "neutral" (or ochre) like a sheet. That's why it is not nudity, just like it would be absurd thinking that a face is nude. Such neutrality also means essentiality of a life style in which the body is one thing with the surrounding landscape and animals. It's the essentiality of subsistence, that is a kind of life on which resources have a direct impact. The beauty of the Himba is amazing and surprising because it conforms to criteria that are very different from ours. Caminata has the difficult task of discovering and picturing it.

Approaching a population that lives in small groups scattered in the desert with no point of reference was not so easy. Nor was it to gain their confidence and communicate with them, as the Himba don't speak Afrikaans nor a regional dialect but they speak their own language. Caminata did, trusting his instinct. He did it with discretion, living with them naturally without worrying about the scoop. He captured the secret of their beauty, of their feeling themselves and other people charming, in a context in which nudity is dressed like a face.

The exhibition pictures their everyday life and the absoluteness of their gestures.

The brochure published by Federico Motta Editore includes 93 big-sized black and white photographs, which shows Caminata's work.

Sergio Caminata

Born in Milan in 1955, after studying photography at the Istituto Rizzoli and after a short period studying architecture at Milan University, Caminata decided to devote himself only to photography. Assistant photographer in 1976, then in 1980 fashion photographer he worked with the most famous Italian as well as international magazines, e.g. Amica, Anna, Donna, Gioia, Grazia, Cosmopolitan, Elle, Freundin, Fur Sie, Harper's Bazar, Madame Figarò, MarieClaire. He also collaborated to some advertising campaigns including the one for Coca-Cola

He was entrusted with the realisation of the photographs for François Mitterand's electoral campaign, which marked another very important stage of his career. He also directed commercials for the Italian and foreign television. Around 1985 he presented the "Fotogalleria" on the theme "Stilisti in primo piano" in association with the centre "Il diaframma" In 1994 he took part in the group exhibition for Amnesty International 100 Fotografi Italiani (100 Italian photographers). In that period he began travelling to Africa. A lot of the photos he took there were put on the covers of famous novels published by Feltrinelli, e.g. Sorriso Africano by Doris Lessing, Ebano and Lapidarium by Ryszard Kapuscinski. The best pictures are collected in the volume Ndebele published by Federico Motta Editore in 1998. A selection of Caminata's works appears in New notes on Kaoko, published by Giorgio Miescher & Dag Henrichsen for Basler Africa Bibliographien, a scientific publication on the Kaokoland inhabitants. Always in 1998 Caminata took part in the exhibition entitled "Identita' e differenza" mounted in association with the UN. One year later he was invited to participate in the group exhibition entitled "Dalla terra alle genti", hosted in San Marino Republic.