Echoes from the Borderlands: A Special Adaptation

Valeria Luiselli, Leonardo Heiblum and Ricardo Giraldo will present a selection from their work in progress, Echoes From The Borderlands, a sound piece that documents the histories of violence against land and bodies in the US-Mexico borderlands. It works like a sonic roadtrip that begins in the pounding waves of the Pacific Ocean in the Tijuana /San Diego border, and moves eastward throughout 24 hours —from sunrise to sunrise— until it reaches the wetlands of the Texan coast. Through the merging of narratives, soundscapes, voices, melodies, rhythms, archival recordings, and sound constellations, the piece connects issues that have marked the borderlands, such as the genocide of native peoples, extractivism, nuclear testing, migration, femicide, vigilantism, human trafficking, and mass detention. These stories of plundering and exploitation, however, are also met with stories of resilience and resistance. Following the presentation Luiselli, Heilblum and Giraldo will participate in a developmental discussion about the piece.

Echoes from the Borderland is being developed in partnership with Dia Art Foundation.

Valeria Luiselli is the award winning author of Faces in the Crowd (2013), Tell Me How It Ends (2017) and Lost Children Archive (2019). Her work has been translated to over 30 languages and she became a Macarthur Fellow in 2020.

Leonardo Heilblum is an award-winning composer, producer and sound artist who has composed music for over 50 feature films. He collaborates regularly with Philip Glass, Patti Smith, and musicians from all over the world, mixing classical and indigenous instruments with field recordings.

Ricardo Giraldo works in sound, film promotion, contemporary classical music, audiovisual media and exhibit design. He is the director of the Podcast Division of La Corriente del Golfo, Diego Luna and Gael Garcia Bernal’s production company.