The first of Sara Sori’s portraits depicting women at various stages of life shows a young, happy girl. “If you harm [a girl] at this stage she is ruined for ever. And this is the stage where I was violated,” says Sori, from Isiolo, in northern Kenya, who was forced to undergo female genital mutilation as a child.
Another portrait shows a girl with her mouth sewn shut, “giving in to what life has dictated for her and to prevent her from expressing any anger”. Another shows “the age of regret, of missed opportunities” of an older woman. “This is where my grandmother is now. I loved her so much. She wanted me to get married to a good man and the only way to do that was by getting the cut. She, too, went through similar initiation rites and cannot undo the past.”
