MartinWeber

A Map of Latin American Dream

A Map of Latin American Dreams explores the desires and hopes of individuals throughout Latin America. It explores how individual lives have been directly touched and altered by local, national and regional traumatic events and policies.

The work aspires to amplify the voices of the under-represented, to give each subject dimension through their personal stories. From 1992 through 2008, I made trips to Argentina, Cuba, Mexico, Peru, Nicaragua, Guatemala, Brazil and Colombia. I photographed families, groups and individuals. Their voices are expressed within each image using a hand- held blackboard with writing in chalk. “Can you write down a wish or a dream that you have?” A melancholic gesture or one implied exists in the process of asking someone to think of a dream or a wish: something not fulfilled. It is true that we are living in a time when stability is often a distant memory. Constant crises remind us just how fragile the terrain remains. I see my photographs as vehicles, records of an event, a performance, a happening. The sitters willingly engaged and openly shared secrets that are disclosed beyond their appearances. Presentation of the images reveals the transition between the banality of everyday life and the extraordinary event of a shared moment. I learned much about myself, and the people I met. Our encounters carry a defiant gesture.