Migration, Art, and Politics Lecture: Can Art Reduce Border Violence? A Discussion with Raúl Paz Pastrana and Jason de León  

This program is presented in conversation with the Henry’s upcoming exhibition of Hostile Terrain 94, and is in partnership with the Simpson Center and the Art at the Borders of the Political project.

To stem the immigration tide, Mexico and the U.S. collaborate to crack down on migrants, forcing them into ever more dangerous territory and resulting in an innumerable amount of pain and suffering. Through the film Border South/Frontera Sur and the participatory art installation Hostile Terrain 94, Raúl Paz Pastrana and Jason De León offer publics across the Americas new ways to think and feel about the tragic consequences of U.S. and Mexican border policies. Join us for a virtual discussion and find out on how you can get involved.

Raúl O. Paz Pastrana is a Mexican immigrant filmmaker, cinematographer, and multimedia creator. His work explores themes of “belonging” and “alienation” in immigrant communities. His films have screened at the Museum of the Moving Image (MoMI) in New York City, at the Sheffield Doc/Fest in the UK, and at DocsMX in Mexico City. He is a 2018 Princess Grace Awards Special Project Grantee, an Art Matters/Jerome Foundation Cassis France Arts Fellow, a Tribeca Film Institute All Access grant recipient, a 2018 IFP Filmmaker Labs fellow, a 2018-20 Firelight Media Documentary Lab Fellow, and a 2018-19 Ford Foundation grantee.

Jason De León is a Mexican-American and Filipino-American Professor of Anthropology and Chicano Studies at the University of California, Los Angeles. He directs the Undocumented Migration Project (UMP), a long-term scientific study of clandestine border crossing. De León was awarded the 2016 Margaret Mead Award for his book The Land of Open Graves and named a 2017 MacArthur Foundation fellow.