Sleeping by the River, Tecun-Uman Guatemala

2020

Ada Trillo

(Mexican American, b. 1976)

Culture

America

Medium

digital print

Measurements

Framed: 54.4 x 79.7 cm (21 7/16 x 31 3/8 in.); Image: 50.8 x 76.2 cm (20 x 30 in.)

Credit Line

Gift of the Artist 2024.24

This artwork is known to be under copyright.

Location

Not on view

Did You Know?

A Mexican-American artist from the border, Ada Trillo spent years traveling with the Migrant Caravans from Honduras to the US-Mexico border, taking photographs of their journey.

Description

In Sleeping by the River, a naked infant sleeps on a pile of clothing on the banks of the Suchiate River, the waterway that forms the border between Guatemala and Mexico. In the shade of a tree, the baby is surrounded by evidence of hundreds of asylum seekers’ journey, with clothing hung up to dry on makeshift clotheslines, while people bathe in the river in the background. While recording the labor and sacrifice of transporting an infant a distance of nearly three thousand miles, the image offers a rare moment of peaceful repose. In humanizing the reality of the migrants’ journey, the photographs provide “a glimpse into the plight of asylum seekers and migrants, hard-working people banded together for a chance at a better life.”