Photo: Richard Misrach. Wall, East of Nogales, Arizona, 2015. Pigment print, 60 x 80 inches. Edition 1 of 5.
A barrier 1,969 miles in length runs through the southwestern desert separating Mexico and the United States, a physical symbol of the international politics of the new millennium. It is not one continuous wall, but rather a series of walls and fences strategically placed to inhibit the illegal border crossings. The barriers were built as part of three larger “Operations” in California, Texas, and Arizona enacted by President George W. Bush in 2006 with the intention to create a border protection/anti-terrorism/illegal immigration triple threat.
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For the past decade, the wall has been a source of great debate, a subject that inflames the hearts of countless Americans on both sides of the issue. More recently, the wall has been invoked by Donald Trump, who cast it in a starring role in his campaign, stating, “I would would a great wall—and nobody builds walls better than me, believe me —and I’ll build them very inexpensively. I will build a great, great wall on our southern border, and I will make Mexico pay for that wall. Mark my words.”
Guillermo Galindo. Micro Orchestra, 2014. Found child’s tennis shoes. Dimensions variable. Courtesy of the artist
The border wall is more than a symbol of the power to divide; it is a symbol of the ability to control minds. The United States is a country populated exclusively by the descendants of immigrants and survivors of genocide; when Trump invokes the creation of a great wall he overtly aligns himself on the wrong side of history.
In a curious confluence of events, photographer Richard Misrach and composer Guillermo Galindo have collaborated on Border Cantos, a new exhibition at the San Jose Museum of Art, California, now through July 26, 2016. The exhibition features 36 monumental landscape photographs by Misrach alongside 17 hand-crafted musical instruments created by Galindo from found objects recovered from the border. A discarded food can becomes the resonating chamber of an instrument modeled on a single-stringed Chinese erhu; empty shot gun shells are strung together to create a variation of a West African shaker. Accompanying the artwork is a sound installation featuring three pieces composed by Galindo made from the sculptures on view, bringing the experience of crossing the desert to life in a way that alternately be stills and overwhelms.
Richard Misrach. Border Patrol Target Range, Boca Chica Highway, Lower Rio Grande National Wildlife Refuge, Texas, 2013. Pigment print, 60 x 80 inches. Edition 1 of 5.
Misrach has been photographing the American west for forty years, using large-format camera to create epic works of art. His work has taken on subjects like urban sprawl, industrialization, tourism, natural disasters, and nuclear weapons; immigration became a subject when Misrach first came across the border in 2004.
He remembers, “I photographed a water station. I didn’t know what it was. There are blue barrels with the word ‘agua’ on them spaced out strategically so that people don’t die while they are crossing the desert. I photographed it and put it away. In 2009, I started to notice the border area was being militarized; there was more surveillance and it felt differently. I found human effigies, sculptures, very mysterious things. I photographed those. Years later, I saw Guillermo Galindo in Oakland. He had a pop-up performance with instruments he had made out of found objects. The piece blew me away. I invited him to the studio. That was four years ago. We’ve been collaborating ever since. I started to bring things back from the border, like shotgun shells, a section of the wall, shoes, and backpacks. He would make instruments from these then make scores for the photographs that he played on these instruments.”
Border Cantos beautifully blends photography, sculpture, and soundscapes into a singular experience meant to invoke energies of the land where the border resides, an ancient and historic thoroughfare that predates the United States by millennia. Galindo observes, “Border Cantos is dedicated to, ‘All of those who cross borders risking everything in search of a better life.’ Personally, to me, it means a tipping point in my creative skills as an artist and composer and a humbling and understanding experience of the immigrant experience of my people.”
Guillermo Galindo. Zapatofono, 2012. Found shoe; gravel, wood handle, and amplified wooden tray. 17 x 9 x 12 inches. Courtesy of the artist
Galindo explains the process for creating the instruments, revealing, “The meaning behind my instruments comes from the circumstances surrounding the objects, the anonymous immigrant that carried it and the purpose of each object throughout the journey. These objects don’t exist alone but within particular contexts. You can always find any of these items in a recycling bin or in a landfill but what justifies their geographical/ historical location and the universe of meaning surrounding their existence. The combination of all of these factors is what tells the story.”
It is this ability to tell the story in sight and sound that makes Border Cantos an exhibition to behold with open eyes and an open heart. Border Cantos premieres at SJMA and then travels to the Amon Carter Museum of American Art, Fort Worth, and Crystal Bridges Museum of American Art, Bentonville, Arkansas.
Photos: © Richard Misrach, Courtesy Fraenkel Gallery, San Francisco, Pace/MacGill Gallery, New York, and Marc Selwyn Fine Art, Los Angeles.
Miss Rosen is a New York-based writer, curator, and brand strategist. There is nothing she adores so much as photography and books. A small part of her wishes she had a proper library, like in the game of Clue. Then she could blaze and write soliloquies to her in and out of print loves.
