A Stunning Portrait of 22-Year-Old Penha Goez, a Tribeswoman of the Amazon Rainforest in Brazil, 1997

Portrait of Penha Goes, age 22, a tribeswoman in the Yanomami tribe of the Amazon Rainforest in Brazil, taken by photographer Richard Stuckert in 1997. The tribe is divided into around 250 villages along with border with Brazil and Venezuela. They have 35,000 members.

And here are close-up portraits of Penha Goes at 22 and 39 years old, when she reunited with Richard Stuckert in 2015:

Stuckert said of his photos:

“On Indian Day, I want to pay homage to India Yanomami Penha Goés. She was the one who sparked my interest, passion and motivation to photograph Brazilian Indians. I photographed Penha for the first time in 1997, in the Maturacá Community, in the Amazon. She was 22, a son of two and a story all at once.

“In 2015, in a conversation with my wife, Cristina, I talked about the desire to see her again. It was the first step toward the date I’ve been waiting almost 20 years to happen. May 2015 I left Brasilia and went to Manaus. From there, I followed on to São Gabriel da Cachoeira, a city inside the Amazonas. A kite (typical Amazon ship) was waiting for me. It took 8 hours by boat to reach the village.

“When I found the Penha again, I didn’t see that 20-something-year-old girl, but a 39-year-old woman who kept the same purity in her eyes 17 years ago. There I was sure that I was on a mission not only to photograph India which marked my professional career, but to humbly pay tribute to the indigenous people of my country.”