‘Stephanie was 17, a Guatemalan migrant about to try to enter the US. She took this herself, radiating serenity during one of the most precarious moments of her life’
Early last year, there were migrant caravans approaching the US border. They weren’t the first, nor will they be the last, but it was another flashpoint in a long history of migration to the US, this time against the backdrop of a heated presidential election. There was a feeling in Central and South America that a Joe Biden victory might mean more favourable conditions for those trying to cross into the US. When Biden won, the flashpoint intensified.
There was very little work being done on the Mexican side of the border. There were lots of images of distraught people struggling across the Rio Grande, but fewer of people earlier in the journey, and fewer still that gave those people a sense of personhood beyond their pain. When I was thinking of ways to make the series different, I remembered the work of Adam Broomberg and Oliver Chanarin. They made a series about people in psychiatric institutions, giving patients a cable release and letting them produce images of themselves: selfies before their time. There was a sense of dignity, even humour, that made the series memorable.
