Bound to El Norte
Artist
Don Bartletti
(American, born 1947)
Date2000; print 2021
MediumArchival pigment print
DimensionsPaper: 26 x 36 in. (66 x 91.4 cm)
Other (Image): 20 x 30 in. (50.8 x 76.2 cm)
ClassificationsPhotographs
Credit LineMuseum purchase, funds provided by the Caroline Julier and James G. Richardson Acquisition Fund
Object number2021.27.1
Description“September 11, 2000, Teotihuacan, Mexico. A Central American boy sits atop a speeding freight train. I rode all night from tropical Veracruz through tunnels and the cold mountain passes to Mexico City. At first light, I spotted a tiny figure seated 3 hopper cars ahead. I jogged forward and leaped from car to car to reach him before we were enveloped in fog. I squeezed off a few horizontal and vertical frames. I got one step closer, about to ask his name when I saw he was shivering and sobbing. My empathy as a parent pulled me back from a private moment I felt should be his alone. The anonymous, underdressed boy in a dirty shirt never noticed me on his sojourn to El Norte somewhere on the invisible horizon.” – Don Bartletti
