writing
I’ve found that the written word is often the best form of contextualization for photographic imagery. By virtue of the medium, photography is a decontextualized form of information dissemination. It is difficult to understand the impact or meaning of a standalone photograph (or set of photographs) without written context. For instance, if I were to simply show you my Beyond Borders photography without any sort of written explanation, the imagery would have less depth and it would be much more difficult to understand the conceptual factors driving my work, which are arguably equally important as the actual photographs themselves.
An image is a moment in time taken out of context of the moments before it and after it: a photograph is not a fact or objective. When I surround my images with words, I create factual context for them. Thus, I can tell stories that are both meaningful/powerful and true to their roots.
Fires at this northern Iraqi refugee camp disintegrated ~400 tent shelters, displacing thousands of Yezidi refugees
charred tent foundations caked with ash litter the arid ground
Some years ago, I published my book (left). In it, I chronicle the reality of the US-Mexico border in particular, really diving into the depths of every perspective I encountered. It includes hundreds of my documentary images which are accompanied by the written word to create context for the visuals and verbally tell the stories of immigrants, border patrol agents, refugees, generational residents, and experts. Funds raised from book sales benefited the National Border Patrol Museum; STORY, a gathering of artists; and the purchase of academic textbooks for students residing at the US-Mexico border.
I am on the editorial board for the ReMarker, which means I play a large role in pitching and voting on the topics of the editorial pieces and columns that will be included in each issue. Late in 2021, I pitched and wrote a column on the implications of a highly disputed drone restriction law in Texas that limits the news gathering abilities of Texas journalists. I felt a unique connection to this issue given my experience with visual reporting.
I have contributed to a study lesson (see below)—rooted in geography and the US-Mexico border—published in Junior Scholastic Magazine for middle schoolers across the United States, and here you can find an article I wrote about a year ago for the World Border Congress’s annual Border Security Report, which is distributed to thousands of border security agencies all over the world. Through this article, I aim to provide stories and human realities that I’ve witnessed first hand all over the world in order to give these border security agencies a better idea of the lives they affect through their work.
Below is some of my work and writing for the backpage of the ReMarker.
I worked with two other staff members of the ReMarker to realize Journey Around the World, an 8-page feature piece on my work across world borders. The goal of the piece was to bring the realities of these faraway borders to every St. Mark’s student and faculty member, allowing them to learn more about the world that they live in and the people they share it with. See below.
For this piece, I was awarded First Place Feature Photo, First Place Photo Portfolio, and First Place Photo Story by the University Interscholastic League (UIL). I also won the 2021 Tops in Texas Photo Portfolio and Tops in Texas Feature Photo.