Cultural Refractions Artist Statement
The U.S.—Mexican border es una herida abierta where the
Third World grates against the first and bleeds. And before
a scab forms it hemorrhages again, the lifeblood of two
worlds merging to form a third country—a border culture.
Borderlands: The New Mestiza,
Gloria Anzaldúa, 1987.
Photographs from the project Cultural Refractions: Border Life en la tierra de nadie. This work focuses on the merging of modernity with tradition along the U.S.—Mexican border; it contrasts the North and the South; it establishes a visual dialectic between the two banks of the Rio Grande that narrates the coexistence and contrast of order and chaos, progress and its discontinuity; showing some ambiguities of our modern society.
— Byron BrauchliHay tantísimas fronteras
que dividen a la gente,
pero por cada frontera
existe también un puente.
— Gina Valdés
© Byron Brauchli, 2000