No Place: Somewere is a dialogue between a twelve-minute short video and twelve photographs. It is a meditation on immigration, the desert, and a self-portrait resonating within the landscape.
After receiving a photography fellowship from the John Simon Guggenheim Memorial Foundation in 2006, I was inspired to create a video work about immigration. I came to the United States from Venezuela as a young boy and have been working on immigrant-themed projects for many years.
I traveled south on Route 286 in southern Arizona, along the Sasabe road between Tucson and Arivaca, near the U.S.-Mexico border, to capture the migrants as they moved through the desert from Mexico to the United States.
After receiving a photography fellowship from the John Simon Guggenheim Memorial Foundation in 2006, I was inspired to create a video work about immigration. I came to the United States from Venezuela as a young boy and have been working on immigrant-themed projects for many years.
I traveled south on Route 286 in southern Arizona, along the Sasabe road between Tucson and Arivaca, near the U.S.-Mexico border, to capture the migrants as they moved through the desert from Mexico to the United States.
However, the migrants were nowhere to be seen. All my camera captured was dry land and traces of the migrants' presence in the area—lost items, trash, and the like.
I felt that I had reached a dead end in my work and decided to archive the footage unedited. However, now, 17 years after the shooting, I have reviewed the videos and photos taken at that time, edited them from a new perspective, and found new links and meanings.
Exhibition: No Place: Somewere
IG Photo Gallery, Tokyo 2023
I felt that I had reached a dead end in my work and decided to archive the footage unedited. However, now, 17 years after the shooting, I have reviewed the videos and photos taken at that time, edited them from a new perspective, and found new links and meanings.
Exhibition: No Place: Somewere
IG Photo Gallery, Tokyo 2023
