"‘Echoes from the Borderland’: Explore the US-Mexico Border Through Sound" | Culture | EL PAÍS English

*Ecos de la Frontera* ha sido un proyecto que ha requerido cuatro años y medio de trabajo. Es fruto de la creatividad de la escritora mexicana Valeria Luiselli, quien colaboró con Ricardo Giraldo, director de la división de podcasts de La Corriente del Golfo en Ciudad de México, y Leo Heiblum de Encyclopedia Sónica. Los tres se propusieron iniciar la creación de un archivo sonoro que refleje las historias de violencia en la frontera entre Estados Unidos y México. El objetivo final del proyecto es una pieza sonora de 24 horas de duración, que coincida con el tiempo que se tarda en recorrer la frontera de un extremo a otro.

On Wednesday in New York, the project’s Study #1 was presented, a book that comes with a QR code so that it can be read while listening to a 72-minute piece titled Call You When I Get Home. The gallery also presented Study #2, a sound piece divided into four, six-hour segments that each focus on a different border state — California, Arizona, New Mexico, and Texas. That work was commissioned by Humberto Moro and Kamilah N. Foreman in collaboration with the Institute for Studies on Latin American Art, and its segments will be played consecutively on the days the Día Art Foundation in Chelsea is open through March 1.

The starting point for the project was when Foreman, Día Art Foundation’s director of publications, called up Luiselli in 2020, in the middle of the pandemic, to inquire into what the writer was working on. In recent years, Luiselli’s literature has become well-known for its powerful political grounding, and places a special emphasis on questioning immigration policies. Her work has served as a catalyst in the understanding of the migrant experience in the United States, particularly that of children.