Echoes from the Borderlands (Ecos de la frontera) de Valeria Luiselli, Ricardo Giraldo y Leo Heiblum es una serie de estudios sonoros que exploran la historia de la frontera entre México y Estados Unidos, desde el Océano Pacífico hasta el Golfo de México. Este invierno, Dia presenta Echoes from the Borderlands: Study Two (Ecos de la frontera: Estudio dos), que combina material de archivo con grabaciones de campo y conversaciones, para resaltar temas como el genocidio de los pueblos nativos, la migración, los derechos reproductivos y la destrucción del medio ambiente. El público está invitado a experimentar este proyecto en cuatro segmentos de seis horas en un recorrido por California, Arizona, Nuevo México y Texas, que se reproducirán consecutivamente durante los días de apertura de Dia Chelsea.

En conjunto con la exposición se publica un libro escrito por Luiselli, Giraldo y Heiblum.

Echoes from the Borderlands: Study Two fue curada por Kamilah N. Foreman, directora de publicaciones, y Humberto Moro, director adjunto de programa.

Echoes from the Borderlands fue organizada en colaboración con el Institute for Studies on Latin American Art (ISLAA). 

Todas las exposiciones de Dia son posibles gracias al Economou Exhibition Fund. 

Echoes from the Borderlands se desarrolló en Dia Art Foundation; en el ArtLab de Harvard University, Cambridge, Massachusetts; en BeluRecords, Ciudad de México; y en La Corriente del Golfo Podcast, Ciudad de México; con el generoso apoyo de Laurie Gunst y Karen Yamashita.

Echoes from the Borderlands is a collective formed by Valeria Luiselli, Ricardo Giraldo, and Leo Heiblum, as well as the title of a series of sound studies about the U.S.–Mexico border. The collective’s work is conceived as a collection of “echoes,” stemming from the premise that everything they document is a trace left by an event, which will continue to ripple and reverberate across time and space.

Echoes from the Borderlands: Study Two is a 24-hour “sonic documentary-fiction,” in the artists’ words, that asks the question: What do the borderlands sound like? The piece is a timely meditation on a long-contested terrain, structured like a road trip along the U.S. side of the border, from the Pacific Ocean to the Gulf of Mexico. It passes through detention-center complexes, artichoke fields, military proving grounds, reservations, desert dust storms, bends of the Rio Grande, and rocket-launching sites, among many other soundscapes.

In the exhibition at Dia Chelsea, visitors can immerse themselves in a quadraphonic experience of the borderlands in the gallery space and binaurally through headphones. At the work’s sonic core is the “canvas,” a layer of recordings from the border states. The canvas is an enduring element, and even when the piece appears nearly silent, the canvas is always there. Dozens of recordings reveal the everyday activity of plants, people, and animals, and sounds of the landscape, presented in nonlinear, at times overlapping layers. The artists have threaded into the canvas field recordings, their conversations with people, and sparse notes made along the way about the recording process itself.

The 24 hours of recordings of Echoes from the Borderlands: Study Two are divided equally into four sections representing the U.S. border states: California, Arizona, New Mexico, and Texas. The sections can be listened to over the course of four days, each one focused on a single state and lasting six hours. Together they aim to construct a 24-hour day, and when overlapped, they capture the linear passage of time, from dawn to dawn. As a nod to the entirety of the durational piece, each section begins at sunrise with an underwater prologue in the Pacific and ends with a corresponding underwater epilogue at the following sunrise in the Gulf of Mexico.

Echoes from the Borderlands: Study Two lies within Dia’s extensive support of Land art since the 1970s and of contemporary artists’ continued examinations of the meaning and value of land. Addressing both historic and contemporary mechanisms of systemic violence and exploitation, Study Two is an assemblage of narratives and subjects: the romanticized, foundational myths of the Wild West; the genocide of Native peoples; vigilante culture; migratory flux and anti-immigrant sentiments; nuclear testing; extractivism; the detention-center industry; and the revival of space travel. The artists have also captured key voices of hope, resistance, and resilience that talk about rain, animals, mountains, rivers, languages, humor, legends, memory, and imagination.

The piece deploys sound to transport visitors to the region and uses an echo as a central metaphor. The multiple layers add nuance and depth to the collective understanding of the border, emphasizing the stories of those who have lived through its tumultuous history. The listener is then enveloped by the vastness of the borderlands and can feel the passage of time.

—Kamilah N. Foreman and Humberto Moro

Echoes from the Borderlands: Study Two, 2024
Digital audio, speakers, and headphones, 4 parts, 6 hrs. each
Courtesy the artists

Each day is dedicated to one of the work’s four parts, covering one border state and running for six hours, respectively.

Dia Chelsea is open Tuesday–Saturday, 12–6 pm. 

December 18: Texas
December 19: California
December 20: Arizona
December 21: New Mexico

December 25: Closed
December 26: Texas
December 27: California
December 28: Arizona

January 1: Closed
January 2: New Mexico
January 3: Texas
January 4: California

January 8: California
January 9: Arizona
January 10: New Mexico
January 11: Texas

January 15: Texas
January 16: California
January 17: Arizona
January 18: New Mexico

January 22: New Mexico
January 23: Texas
January 24: California
January 25: Arizona

January 29: Arizona 
January 30: New Mexico
January 31: Texas
February 1: California

February 5: California
February 6: Arizona
February 7: New Mexico
February 8: Texas

February 12: Texas
February 13: California
February 14: Arizona
February 15: New Mexico

February 19: New Mexico
February 20: Texas
February 21: California
February 22: Arizona

February 26: Arizona 
February 27: New Mexico
February 28: Texas
March 1: California

Valeria Luiselli was born in Mexico City in 1983. She is the author of several books, including the internationally acclaimed Lost Children Archive (2019), and her work has been translated into 30 languages. She is the recipient of a MacArthur Fellowship (2019), as well as an American Book Award (2018) and a Dublin Literary Award (2021), among other honors. Luiselli teaches at Bard College, Annandale-on-Hudson, New York, and Harvard University, Cambridge, Massachusetts. She lives in New York.

Ricardo Giraldo was born in Cali, Colombia, in 1971. He works in sound, contemporary classical music, and exhibition design, and has served as the composer-in-residence for the Residentie Orkest of the Hague. He directed the documentary film festival Ambulante (2009–10), as well as Cinema23 and the Fénix Film Awards (2012–19). Together with Gael García Bernal and Diego Luna, he founded the podcast division of the production company La Corriente del Golfo. He lives in Mexico City.

Leo Heiblum was born in Mexico City in 1970. He is a composer, producer, and sound artist. He studied piano and composition in Mexico City, tabla in India, son jarocho in Veracruz, and Latin American music in Argentina. He has collaborated with Philip Glass, Patti Smith, and the Soundwalk Collective on albums and, with the latter two, the exhibition Evidence at the Centre Pompidou, Paris (2022–23). He has scored over 40 feature films, many of which received awards at major international film festivals. His album Encyclopedia Sonica Vol.1 was released in 2024. He lives in Tepoztlán, Mexico.

Echoes from the Borderlands | October 31, 2024

Ecos de la frontera | 31 de octubre de 2024