Alessandra Meniconzi | The Cradle of Humanity

Photo © Alessandra Meniconzi-All Rights Reserved

One of my favorite travel photographers is Alessandra Meninconzi who has recently uploaded her new work from Ethiopia, which she titled The Cradle of Humanity. Her photographs were mostly made in Lalibela, and its surrounding region.

Her gallery features Ethiopian Orthodox priests, deacons and scribes who visit or reside in Lalibela, one of Ethiopia's holiest cities, and a center of pilgrimage for much of the country. It's famous for its monolithic rock-cut churches. These religious clergy are required to have knowledge of Ge’ez, the ancient liturgical language of the Ethiopian and Eritrean Orthodox churches.

Cradle of humanity as a title for Alessandra's gallery is a little confusing, since Ethiopia is generally known as the cradle of mankind, while the cradle of humankind is a World Heritage Site first named by UNESCO in 1999, not far from Johannesburg.

Alessandra's galleries range from the Arctic Siberia to Ethiopia, from Lapland to the Silk Road, and from Greenland to Tibet and the Himalayas. She worked extensively for more than a decade in the remote areas of Asia, documenting minority people and their traditional cultures. More recently, she focused on the Arctic and sub-Arctic regions that are threatened by climate change, development, and resource extraction.

Alessandra Meniconzi is a Swiss photographer fascinated by the lives and traditions of indigenous people in remote regions of the world.Her photographs have been published widely in magazines, as well as in four books: The Silk Road (2004), Mystic Iceland (2007), Hidden China (2008) and QTI -Alessandra Meniconzi, Il coraggio di esser paesaggio (2011).

I have blogged on many occasions about Alessandra's work, and I'm glad to see she's back in full form.