Genur.art

Kiese, a tailed woman in her late twenties, stands with her back three-quarters to the vantage, her deep brown skin catching the amber edge of the dying light, her tall frame and broad shoulders filling the lower third as the slightly low angle looks up along her spine. Her dozen chunky box braids are gathered off her neck in a thick twisted knot, two loose ends swinging at her nape. One strong hand grips her short tail an inch below the base and holds it lifted clear of her waistband, the tail bare skin like the rest of her body; her other strong hand rests on her hip. She turns her chin over her right shoulder and smiles broadly, cheek and one small hoop earring lit hard from behind. Stacked beaded wristbands ride up her lifting forearm. The sleeveless cropped football jersey in sun-bleached yellow rucks above her ribs, her drawstring track pants rolled low at the back, a pair of gardening gloves shoved into one pocket with the fingers hanging out, muddy trainers planted in wet soil. Behind her the 50mm rendering keeps the chain-link fence woven with bindweed crisp before the shallow focus falls away into four bean rows; nine staked tomato plants and two beds of collards sit in raised timber frames, the shared shed's padlock dangling under four names painted on the door, a green hose coiled over a cracked water butt. Warm backlit golden-hour key blows out the rooftops to white and throws heavy lens flare across the frame, fine grain holding in the shadowed furrows. Shot on Kodak Portra 400 in a Nikon FM2.