The Xalcingo canyon as well as most of the other urban canyons in Cuernavaca is a complex ecosystem. It crosses the city as a crack that interrupts the landscape and goes down a few to hundreds of meters. This is a place with its own rules, very different from the city itself. Out of the city map, nature is still playing a valid role here. Huge amate trees grow inside, water flows through them. Animals like crabs, parrots, and snakes that have already disappeared from the city still can find here a shelter. Along with the dysfunctional urbanization of the area around the canyons, the pollution of these places has become the main problem. Solid and liquid wastes fulfill the canyons to such an extent that they have become toxic outbreaks and garbage dumps.
The photos were realized as a side work while developing the project «Barranca Negra» – a two-year collaboration with the community of Xalcingo in Cuernavaca, México. The photos register a relationship that was developed with the local community based on the principles of camaraderie. The creative process – a mixture of pedagogy, art, and social space – has become a sort of alchemic remedy; a safe space where everyone can find itself in the center of the creative act in the core of an ecological and social crisis.
