Seconded By: Britta Jaschinski,
With no Ithaca awaiting explores the boundaries between photojournalism and documentary by portraying human mobility within Mexican territory. It focuses on migrants, delving into their emotional processes as they navigate global sociopolitical barriers in search of better living conditions.
The project aims to visualize the limbo that encompasses geographical territory and the body, revealing the changes that occur from day to night, translating into the journey itself between the northern and southern borders of Mexico.
Inspired by 17th-century pictorial works, The project employs direct photography to narrate the sensitivity, resilience, and courage of those expelled from their countries due to marginalization, climate change, modern dictatorships, and violence.
The title “Sin Ítaca que aguarde” or “With no Ithaca awaiting” is an excerpt from the poem “Peregrino” by Luis Cernuda. This phrase suggests a quest without a certain final destination or a place of rest. It is an expression rich in meaning, perhaps indicating a sense of uncertainty, the idea of a perpetual journey, or a path without a clear end in sight.
Through light and captured moments, this project seeks to tell the human stories behind the statistics, highlighting the complexity and humanity in each image.
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A Haitian migrant swims back across the Rio Grande from the United States to Mexico after the patrol did not allow him to enter the United States. In Ciudad Acuña, México. On September, 19, 2021.
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A man with a migrant baby laments after the group of migrants they were coming with was secured by the National Migration Institute and the Navy Secretariat in a warehouse of the Hotel Azteca in the city of Veracruz, Mexico, on June 27, 2019 following a massive raid on various hotels and motels in the area.
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Migrants, mainly Latin American, climb a trailer for transportation during the migrant caravan in the municipality of Jesus Carranza, Veracruz, Mexico, November 17, 2021.
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A Central American migrant watches from the window of a bus after leaving the migrant caravan and turning himself in to immigration authorities to begin his regulatory process, in the municipality of Jesus Carranza, Veracruz, Mexico, November 17, 2021.
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U.S. Customs and Border Protection officers, mounted on horseback, attempt to stop migrants crossing the Rio Grande River from Ciudad Acuna, Mexico, into Del Rio, Texas, Sunday, Sept. 19, 2021.
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A Haitian girl is carried by her father as they cross the Rio Grande from Del Rio, Texas, to return to Ciudad Acuña, Mexico, to avoid deportation to Haiti, on September 19, 2021. The U.S. is flying Haitians camped in a Texas border town back to their homeland and blocking others from crossing the border from Mexico in a massive show of force that signals the beginning of what could be one of America’s swiftest, large-scale expulsions of migrants or refugees in decades.
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A Honduran migrant stands behind branches as he watches U.S. immigration authorities in front of the border fence as he attempts to cross into the United States, Nov. 30, 2018, in Playas de Tijuana, Mexico.
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The big border wall is seen snaking up the hills from a highway in Tijuana, Mexico, on February 12, 2025.
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Three Honduran migrants, belonging to the Migrant Caravan, are arrested by the elements of the Border Patrol after invading US soil, on November 30, 2018.
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Relatives and friends react as the bodies of Jair Valencia, Misael Olivares, and Yovani Valencia arrive to their family house in San Marcos Atexquilapan, Veracruz state, Mexico, Wednesday, July 13, 2022. The three were among a group of migrants who died of heat and dehydration in a locked trailer-truck abandoned by smugglers on the outskirts of San Antonio, Texas, on June 27.