BORDER HOPELESSNESS THROUGH THE LENS OF FELIPE ROMERO
Felipe Romero (Bogota, Colombia, 1992) usually shows in his photographic proposal a high interest in conflict zones. While the scenario reflects this palpable but still intangible tension, it also serves as a reflective framework where the conflict and its protagonists meet.
In his Bravo project, on display at the KBre Photography Center of Fundación MAPFRE in Barcelona, Romero takes the natural course of the Bravo River, which delimits the border between the United States and Mexico for more than half of its course, although he focuses his attention on the specific stretch where hundreds of immigrants from Central and South America are concentrated as the last step in their migratory journey.
Bravo is transformed into a photographic essay that portrays the reality of a collective that advances towards the end of its journey, but runs the risk of not overcoming and reaching its goal. The river functions as a limit, and not so much as that reflective frame of other of his productions, and stands as an insurmountable barrier and, at the same time, as a modulating entity of a new identity and way of life of those who arrive there.
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Felipe Romro. Amigo de El Friki y pared rosa, 2021-2024 (Detalle). Impresión Lambda. © Felipe Romero Beltrán. Cortesía de KBr Fundación Mapfre
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Felipe Romero. Martel. © Felipe Romero Beltrán. Cortesía de KBr Fundación Mapfre
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Felipe Romero. Espejo. Casa de El Sower. © Felipe Romero Beltrán. Cortesía de KBr Fundación Mapfre
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Felipe Romero. Brecha #1. © Felipe Romero Beltrán. Cortesía de KBr Fundación Mapfre
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Felipe Romero. Pared y dos puertas. Casa de Rebeca. © Felipe Romero Beltrán. Cortesía de KBr Fundación Mapfre
The almost anemic and daily expression of the protagonists in their landscapes, the architectural elements that are produced, the construction of the ephemeral in hope, but of the eternal in reality, result in the creation of an imaginary that drinks from the idea of waiting and that appears inherent to that new identity that is cultivated from patience.
Felipe Romero. Bravo can be seen until May 18 at Centro de fotografía KBre-Fundación MAPFRE, Avenida Litoral, 30, Barcelona (Spain).
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