Nemadis women, Oualata Femmes Nemadis, Oualata

In het unpublished typescript Randone en A.O.F., the artist describes her visit to Oualata. Once of considerable importance, but by this time falling into ruins, it was one of the oldest towns in Mauratania and indeed of French West Africa. "I made studies of a Nemadis woman - a tribe of hunters north of the Sahel - in her white clothes, with her complicated hairstyle of little plaits set with jewels, one would have said a queen of Carthage. On her terrace, Moemmi watched me, at her side, a cheetah was sitting up like a figure on a pilaster. In a shady corner three old women, thin and dried-up, carefully prepared the tea around a little stove. They were still beautiful. Their high spirits contrasted with the solemnity of the young woman. During these posing sessions, the cheetah sometimes became restive and came to nibble my calves. I did not leave him the time to take a liking for this, and put the length of his chain between us".