David Taylor at the Marfa Dialogues

Ballroom Marfa was incredibly lucky to have David Taylor speak at the Marfa Dialogues conference. Taylor spoke about his new book, Working the Line, a photographic examination of the territory that is the U.S./Mexico border, organized around a series of 260 obelisks that demarcate this boundary, which were installed in the late 1880s. In the process of his work, Taylor earned remarkable access to U.S. Border Patrol facilities, agents and routine operations, giving him a unique view into overlapping issues of border security, human and drug smuggling, the continuing construction of the border fence, and its impact on the land.

Mexican student made police chief – Americas – Al Jazeera English

Mexican student made police chief – Americas – Al Jazeera English.

As drugs-related violence in Mexico continues at a staggering pace, in one municipality where seasoned professionals have failed to provide security a 20-year-old student has been appointed as chief of the police force.

Marisol Valles Garcia was sworn in on Wednesday as head of a small police team in Praxeids G Guerrero, one of the most dangerous towns close to the US border, near El Paso in Texas.

However, she will have to juggle the role with other commitments, having yet to complete her degree in criminology in the neighbouring city of Ciudad Juarez, the centre of much of the cartel-related violence, and being the mother of an infant son.

Valles Garcia’s team consists of 13 agents, including nine women, with one patrol car, three automatic rifles and a pistol at their disposal. Praxeids, situated in Chihuahua, Mexico’s most violent state, has a population of 8,500 people.

‘New generation’

Two rival gangs – the Sinaloa and Juarez cartels – are fighting for control of Praxeids, whose single highway is on a drugs smuggling route into Texas.

“The situation can improve if we believe in ourselves and believe there is hope. I want to carry this through and show that we can do this,” Valles Garcia said.

“We are doing this for a new generation of people who don’t want to be afraid anymore.”

Valles Garcia said that she has not received any death threats since assuming her position last week. Her predecessor and the former major did so, but both survived their terms.

The new chief’s police experience is only a stint as a department secretary, although Jose Luis Guerrero, the town’s mayor, said that she was the best candidate for the job from several applicants.

Guerrero had requested proposals on how to improve security in Praxeids from residents, and liked Valles Garcia’s ideas so much that he offered her the position.

Valles Garcia has been assigned two bodyguards but will not carry a gun. She says she will leave most of the decisions about weapons and tactics to Guerrero.

Eight officers in Praxeids quit two years ago due to insecurity, leaving only three at Valles Garcia’s disposal on her arrival. She has since appointed another ten, to which five more will be added.

Mexico is suffering runaway drugs violence, with about 29,000 people being killed in related incidents since Felipe Calderon, the president, began a military crackdown in December 2006.

More than 7,000 people have died in Ciudad Juarez since early 2008.

 

Laura Flanders interviewing Charles Bowden at the Marfa Dialogues

One of the highlights last weekend was Laura Flanders, host of GritTV, interviewing Charles Bowden, journalist and author of Murder City and Down by the River.

We’ll post more videos and photos as we get them.

Special thanks to Karen Bernstein and Susan Simmons for documenting the conference.

Please join us!

September 17-19, 2010
Marfa Dialogues/Diálogos en Marfa
Politics and Culture of the Border
Marfa, Texas

Inspired by art’s potential to elicit critical conversation and generate new ideas, Ballroom Marfa has launched Marfa Dialogues, an initiative to bring together voices reflective of the many perspectives of our diverse community. Please join us in Marfa for our inaugural event, where we will address some of the pressing and complex issues that confront all of us who live in the border region that joins and divides the United States and Mexico.

Ballroom Marfa and The Washington Spectator, in collaboration with The Big Bend Sentinel, Marfa Public Radio and Marfa Book Company, will present Marfa Dialogues: Politics and Culture of the Border, three days of art, film, music, and literature. Be part of dynamic conversations with leading journalists, including Charles Bowden and Mark Danner, listen to the poetry of writer Benjamin Alire Sáenz, see the border through the eyes of photographer David Taylor, and dance to the genre-bending sounds of L.A. band La Santa Cecilia.

Reserve your space at Marfa Dialogues now!

The Marfa Dialogues is funded and supported in part by The Washington Spectator; Kay Taylor Burnett; The Brown Foundation, Inc., Houston; the Texas Commission on the Arts; John Thornton; Fredericka Hunter; and Ballroom Marfa members. Tremendous gratitude to the Thunderbird Hotel for their in-kind support.

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Photo of the U.S./Mexico border at Tijuana by Tomas Castelazo, licensed under the GNU Free Documentation License. Photo of the Rio Grande River in Big Bend National Park, Texas by Daniel Schwen, licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 2.5 Generic license, as is Dan Sorensen’s photo of helicopter border patrol in El Camino del Diablo. Photo of Marfa courtesy of Jonathan Mergele. All other photos released to the public domain.