WELCOME TO INTIPUCA CITY
Intipuca, El Salvador, 2017
A collective project by the photographers Anita Pouchard Serra and Koral Carballo, with the journalist Jessica Avalos.
THE ACTUAL SERIE
Intipucá is neither here nor there: it exists as both at once. Migration to the United States has been a tradition in Intipucá since 1968. As a result of shifts in international migration policy over the years and the circular nature of migration between Central America and the United States, the structure of families in Intipucá has taken on a transnational identity. The United States has become something close and present, despite being geographically distant.
Traditional architecture in Intipucá can scarcely be seen among newly constructed palaces made possible by remittances from North America. Photographs of these houses and their interiors serve as portraits of both absence and aspiration, representing family members who have left and the material influence of the United States.
By combining this documentation of domestic spaces with portraits, interviews, and hand-written family trees drawn by Intipuqueños (names written in red for those living in the United States, and blue for those living in Intipucá), we encourage viewers to reflect on the drivers and consequences of migration for individuals and their families.
TO BE CONTINUED
We will continue this project in El Salvador during an annual local fest, where all the US Salvadorian come back to celebrate once a year, all together and also in the US, with the other parts of the families met in Intipuca, seeking for how El Salvador and Intipuca remain in the US daily life, how families lives divided between 2 territories, how is a life being part of two cultures and how each culture impact each other.
