Summer screen, El Paso – May 2009
Summer is here on the border. Hot. You know it’s summer when the umbrellas are out. Of course what’s in this image is not very “sopisticated.” Who walks in the Brave New World, anyway?
Brave New World / Bad Candy
Que Miras Musico: Change
Musicos, El Paso – April 2009
Wary eyes.
Everyone’s wary, in El Paso/Juarez, these days. The border is at war, with itself, with it’s two yin/yang sides, with the Interiors of each of the two sides.
Everyone’s wondering where it’ll end, where they will fall on the have and have not scale, what’ll be left of this little rough Shangri La (not a Shangri La of paradise but a refuge for those who have fallen from paradise. Sort of a suburb of Shangri La).
TEA Man
TEA Protest, El Paso, Texas – April 15, 2009
This man was photographed in El Paso, Texas at a “TEA party.” At the TEA party are, mostly, the aged and, seemingly, the innocent, with much esoteric political discussion, predictions of the end of the Republic, impassioned anger and, to be fair, much sincerity. To my “”eye,” it seems a little sad. Sadness for what, I am still trying to process and determine.
Star No More
Star No More, Marfa, Texas – March 2009
The West, the American Highway (and the American fascination with it), Funk, ain’t what it used to be.
Fine with me!
Ruin In Motion
No Futbol War
“Maleno,” Juarez – March 2009
Juarez, March 13, 2009/ Estado Benito Juarez, Juarez, Chihuahua/Mexico
The Juarez Indios are a professional futbol team(soccer). They are in the middle of the Cartel Drug War. Much of the city of Juarez has rallied around the Indios, finding some “normalacy,” in the middle of the troubled Juarez violencia. Julio Daniel “Maleno” Frias is a star of the team, a “striker,” a troubled city’s hero. The city loves him, he’s a hero in the middle of bad news caused by rats. When “Maleno,” was younger he joined a gang. He got shot. He decided to change his life and he did. Maybe this is why the city fell in love with him, he’s a living metaphor for a city’s hopes. Maybe they just like the way he plays: smooth, quiet and intense.
Some players have left the team and others have sent their families back to the cities they came from (some in Mexico, one in Argentina), trying to avoid the touch of violence that has afflicted Juarez, Mexico’s third largest city.
The team is struggling to stay in the top tier of Mexico’s professional soccer league.
Attendance is sold out.
Futbol is trumping the war.
So far.
Life goes on.
Border Magic Eye
Cordula at the fence, March 23, 2009
Anapra, NM/Colonia Anapra, Juarez, Chihuahua
Yesterday I worked with an incredible journalist from Der Spiegel (the German equivalent of Time). She is German, from the north of Germany. Works out of the DC Bureau. Sharp and smart and witty and ironic and puro journalist. We did a story at Fort Bliss. She was bright and lively and brave and charming and funny and we’d had a successful day and did a great story together. She wanted to see “El Paso.”
So we head for the border (I’m a one trick pony. To me, the border is El Paso).
Juarez Will Not End
Otra Linea in Juarez, March 2009
You start to wonder if it’ll ever end but it will end.
La violencia. The violence.
Dress Down in El Paso
Dress down in El Paso-March 2009
Sweet Border: Illegal and Bad
Sweet Border, Anapra, NM/Colonia Anapra, Juarez Chihuahua-Feb. 2009
Life goes on.
Mexico is a great pueblo. So is El Paso and southern New Mexico.
One reads the newspapers and one thinks the world has gone insane. Particularly here, on the border.
None Illegal
Border fence at Anapra, NM/Looking into Juarez-02/21/09
The border fence is a stinkin’ dirty bad joke.
Do these kids look like terrorists or narcotraficantes or, even, the dreaded low wage worker that every American company has winked at, invited, used and exploited for decades?
Jumping over El Segundo
Jumping over El Segundo, El Paso-2009
Alameda Street Showboat: Blast From The Past
Alameda Street Showboat, El Paso-1987
Alameda Street is about (what’s this “about,” stuff?) to get stomped. Progress. New Hospital and Medical School down the Street. Progress.
‘ta bien, really. Time to move on. One thing about Urban Renewal and Plans: we have had the best of it and now you can have the rest. The next “blight,” that I move to -older and wiser now- there will be no Forwarding Address.
La Migra Mirando
Sabastio Salgado Speaks
The great Brazilian photographer Sabastio Salgado talks about his work. He is one of the premier “Socially Concerned,”photographers in the world:
Jesus In The ‘Hood
Jesus in the ‘hood, Armijo park, El Paso-2009
Jesus is greeting me. Or showing off his gang signage. Or just jivin’. Behind him, three blocks to the south, is Juarez. Armijo Park, deep in the Segundo barrio of El Paso is Jesus’ refuge.
Mine too.
JUAREZ IN SMOKE
Inauguration day
Inauguration day in New Mexico, Jan. 20, 2009
MLK! Finally!
GOOD THEN AND GOOD TOMORROW: JAN. 20, 2009…
Blight? Schmite! Leave El Barrio alone.
Guadalupe(s), Segundo barrio, El Paso-Oct. 2008
El barrio is a community. Bruised. Not what it was. Sitting on the border and prime target of speculators, er…ah…read that as “Developers,” but still standing. Go back and ask anyone in any American city, for the past 60 years if “Urban Renewal,” was about construction or destruction. If you actually need to, go ahead.
Lady in red (one of everyone)
Lady in red/Segundo barrio, El Paso-2008
Father Rahm Street. The Church is the backdrop. Backdrop for everything. Still, the heart of the Segundo barrio. This is a community that is a community where everything is there. No gates. No price tag. Fifty nine years after the Fair Housing Act of 1949 was enacted -the Urban Renewal Act- this barrio goes on, ethnically Latino, still a community, long after most American city’s inner cores have been cleansed of the “unworthy.”
A Valentine (in Texas)
Cracked window in Valentine, Texas-Jan. 9, 2009
There I am, tooling through the vast landscape of West Texas, working for an English language newspaper working out of Abu Dubai, Arab Emirates. Don’t ask. I’m not sure I understand the assignment. Something about Bush returning to Texas and illustrating what two brothers, who were doing a road trip, saw (except, according to my editor, they were really bad photographers). What that has to do with West Texas, I can’t figure.
Spin Balance landscape
Spin Balance Landscape, Chaparral, NM-August 2008
Space. Glorious space. Wonk yer brain but we all need more space. Maybe because we wonk our brains so much. This is from the funklands of southern New Mexico. It looks right across at the slim tip of West Texas that is El Paso. Juarez, Chihuahua is the horizon.
Space. This is the Tender Mercy of No Man’s Land.
Lomas del Poleo revisited
Protest for Lomas del Poleo, El Paso-Jan. 2008
It was only a year ago that the plight of the people of Lomas del Poleo was the highest priority of cross border activist politics. The people were systematically being robbed of their land, their court actions were, basically, being stonewalled, the injustice of the top to the bottom was blatant and a coalition of forces stepped up and, on this day did, a bi-national protest at the Mexican Counsulate in El Paso and the Mexican Counsulate in Jaurez.
That seems like long ago.
Border Christmas: Grinchy but real!
Border Christmas: Grinchy but real!/El Paso-Dec. 24, 2008
Santa? Juarez needs one
Santa en Juarez-Dieciembre 2008
Venga Santa….come on!
If ever there was a place (other than certain parts of Africa right now) that need some kind of Devine Intervention, this is it.
Come on Santa! Forget the regalos. Paz, baby. Bring on the Peace.
If there is a Santa, bring on the Peace.
Two way island
FBA#20-El Paso/Juarez-Dec. 2008
First block of America (FBA).
El Paso Street. La Frontera. I’d call it Texas but it ain’t. Everyone knows it if they’re from here. Texans hold their arms out, full length. Americans think it’s part of Mexico…or hell. New Mexicans…furgidaboutit! It’s all they have to really feel superior to.
El Paso, the nation-state of nowhere.
Tender mercy
LBI #7 Pano.series-Carlsbad, New Mexico/December2008
Been working on the Land Before the Interstate (LBI) series for a long time. Every chance I get to go there I grab. Time machine. No Interstate. No giant concrete suppository running right through your heart. The kinds of places Duvall would crash down in in Tender Mercies.
Dogs shake the shoe
Shakin’ the shoe, Memorial Park, El Paso-August 2008
Sometimes you just need to stop and smell the roses. Well, in the park, there’s lots of things to smell. A dog’s life can be wonderful. Humans? Well, sometimes, not so much.
One thing for sure: grabbing milliseconds of time out of the megaseconds of life is still -with no great reason behind it- a lot of fun.
The sword of Juarez
The sword of Juarez-November 2008
There’s a sword hanging over Juarez. The sword of Juarez. Murder. 1500, this year and we have a month to go. A drug war? A crazy’s war. Get it over with. Somebody win the war for turf, already. Nobody cares. Get it over with, one side win, one side lose, then send your drug shit to the gringos and let the people go free, let them come out of their houses at night, let the undertakers worry about their bills, again. Somebody win, already, because nobody is winning at all.