Buscando Evidencias Logo

(Looking for Evidence)

A black and white photo of a newspaper with Iraqi war headlines and imagery inside a wired trash can.
A black and white photo of wrinkled icon of an icon of the Statue of Liberty
A black and white photo of a newspaper with Iraqi war headlines and imagery mixed with a muscled body of a naked man
A black and white photo of a newspaper with Iraqi war headlines and imagery mixed with images of escort services inside a wired trash can.
A blurry black and white photo of a newspaper with Iraqi war headlines in Spanish
A black and white photo of a newspaper with Iraqi war headlines and imagery with a banana pill on top of it.
A black and white photo of a newspaper with Iraqi war headlines and imagery inside a plastic wrap covered with bubbles
A black and white photo of a newspaper with Bush mixed with images of people riding elephants.
A black and white photo of a newspaper with Iraqi war headlines and imagery inside a wired trash can.
A black and white photo of a newspaper with Iraqi war headlines and imagery on the pavement.
A black and white photo of a newspaper with Iraqi war headlines and imagery in a trash can
A black and white photo of a newspaper with Iraqi war imaginary on the pavement.
A black and white photo of a newspaper with Iraqi war headlines on the trash
A black and white photo of a newspaper with Iraqi war headlines and imagery inside a wired trash can.
A black and white photo of a newspaper with Iraqi war headlines inside a wired trash can.
A black and white photo of a newspaper with Iraqi war korean headlines and imagery inside a wired trash can.
A black and white photo of a newspaper with Iraqi war headlines and imagery inside a wired trash can.
A black and white photo of a newspaper with Iraqi war headlines and imagery on a puddle of water
A black and white photo of a newspaper image of a gas mask.
A black and white photo of a newspaper with Iraqi war headlines and imagery mixed with dirt
A black and white photo of a newspaper with Iraqi war headlines and imagery mixed with a Mac Donald's friends container inside a wired trash can.
A black and white photo of a newspaper with Iraqi war headlines inside a wired trash can.
A black and white photo of a newspaper with Iraqi war korean headlines and imagery inside a wired trash can.
A black and white photo of a newspaper with Iraqi war headlines and imagery inside a wired trash can.
A black and white photo of a newspaper image of a gas mask.
A black and white photo of a newspaper with Iraqi war headlines and imagery mixed with dirt
A black and white photo of a newspaper with Iraqi war headlines and imagery on a puddle of water
A black and white photo of a newspaper with Iraqi war headlines and imagery mixed with a Mac Donald's friends container inside a wired trash can.
A black and white photo of a newspaper with Iraqi war headlines on the trash
A black and white photo of a newspaper with Iraqi war imaginary on the pavement.
A black and white photo of a newspaper with Iraqi war headlines and imagery in a trash can
A black and white photo of a newspaper with Iraqi war headlines and imagery on the pavement.
A black and white photo of a newspaper with Iraqi war headlines and imagery inside a wired trash can.
A black and white photo of a newspaper with Bush mixed with images of people riding elephants.
A black and white photo of a newspaper with Iraqi war headlines and imagery inside a plastic wrap covered with bubbles
A black and white photo of a newspaper with Iraqi war headlines and imagery with a banana pill on top of it.
A black and white photo of a newspaper with Iraqi war headlines and imagery mixed with images of escort services inside a wired trash can.
A black and white photo of a newspaper with Iraqi war headlines and imagery mixed with a muscled body of a naked man
A black and white photo of a newspaper with Iraqi war headlines and imagery inside a wired trash can.
A black and white photo of wrinkled icon of an icon of the Statue of Liberty

PREFACE

by

Carolee Schneeman

Returning to New York City from Spain, Ivan Cortazar asked, “Where is the war?” as he explored his daily life searching for local evidence of the devastating USA invasion of Iraq.  In sequences of irreducible photographic fragments, Cortazar discovered in our trash the essence of a destruction both distanced and calculated.

Cortazar’s photographic salvage focuses on discarded newspapers thrown into New York City’s typical wire garbage cans.  This enclosure—like barbed wire, permits a perceptual field, which is both contained and permeable.  With a fierce visual grace, Cortazar’s black & white photographs capture random newspaper headlines and image fragments of the hysteria, paranoia, brutality and ruinous waste of this prolonged siege.

The sanitized miscalculations of USA policy are here captured in our trash, discarded reductions of daily tragic history.  The power of these elegant photographs is in their very darkness, the repeated mesh through which he allows us to see a frail debris, a haunting implication of incommensurate loss and suffering.

Looking for Evidence is a documentary project about the 2nd American war against Iraq.

As an alien in the USA, I wanted to document the streets of NYC during the war. 

When the war started I was a complete outsider living in a country at war. I don’t have any relatives in either the US or Iraq. I don’t know any person fighting in that country nor any person directly involved in that conflict. From that perspective, I tried to find the evidence of that war in the streets of NYC.

For me, the city seemed to be the same and only few demonstrations, policemen in the subway and the constant 24-hour news broadcast made me feel that something was not “normal”. But I kept living the same life; went to the movies, had dinner with friends and if I didn’t turn on the TV at night or buy the news, everything would be the same as before the war started.

I realized that basically, the signs of that war on the streets of NYC were newspapers spread massively through out the city. I could see people everywhere buying the news, reading them and soon afterwards, throwing them into the streets. All the garbage cans and sidewalks in the city were filled up with text and images that were telling a distant story.

I wandered the streets of NY searching through the trash for evidence of a war I couldn’t and didn’t want to see with my bear eyes.

I felt so attracted to the fact that image and text were randomly mixed with the trash making natural collages. I say natural because only chance played in their creation, giving those collages a  Dadaist flavor but without a Dada artist behind. Bullets were placed next to banana peels and popular culture debris were mixed up with an image of a chemical mask. The garbage cans were silent witnesses of what was happening, digesting everything and waiting for the next day to get more.

The garbage cans didn’t care about the tragedy of the conflict. They didn’t care about the dead people or the politicians’ words; they just played a foolish game making their own non-sense statements.

Just few weeks after the war started, it became harder and harder to find those signs of war on the streets of New York.

Iván Cortázar

For full preview of the videos, or sales information, please contact:

–  More Photography  –

-   Some Films & Video Art   -

Duermen bajo las aguas

Video Art

Desastre(s)

Short Film

Animales

Video Art

Untied

Short Film

Horizontes

Video Art

Tesoros

Short Film

Me Aburro

Short Film

Scanning USA

Video Art

Sutphin Blvd.

Short Film

Encantamento

Video Art