Backpacks in “Pertenencias" from MOCRA Voices on Vimeo.

Tom Kiefer’s ongoing project “El Sueño Americano / The American Dream” centers on photographs of objects confiscated from migrants and asylum seekers at a U.S. Customs and Border Protection processing facility near Ajo, Arizona. Kiefer recovered the items while working there part-time as a janitor and groundskeeper.

The MOCRA exhibition “Pertenencias / Belongings” places Kiefer’s photographs within a broader consideration of the human need to migrate, driven by the need not only to survive, but to flourish in body, mind and spirit. This human drive often draws on the power of hope and faith, which are reflected and manifested in many of the objects Kiefer documents. The exhibition invites reflection on what it means to possess and what it means to lose, and what it means to belong: how we define who is included and who is excluded, how we distinguish between the sacred and the ordinary, and how those boundaries are enforced.

This video features Kiefer and University of Arizona professor Daisy Vargas discussing a series of backpacks featured in “Pertenencias.“

Tom Kiefer: Pertenencias / Belongings from MOCRA Voices on Vimeo.

In July 2003, fine art photographer Tom Kiefer started working part-time as a janitor and groundskeeper at a U.S. Customs and Border Protection processing facility near Ajo, Arizona. In mid-2007, he was given permission to collect food confiscated from migrants and asylum seekers and donate it to a local food pantry. He was deeply moved at finding personal belongings in the trash bins along with the food. These items, necessary for hygiene, comfort and survival, were deemed “non-essential” or “potentially lethal” and seized and discarded by officials. Kiefer began to quietly rescue what items he could, and he resigned from his job in August 2014 to focus on photographing and documenting them in an ongoing project titled “El Sueño Americano / The American Dream.”

The MOCRA exhibition “Pertenencias / Belongings” places Kiefer’s photographs within a broader consideration of the human need to migrate, driven by the need not only to survive, but to flourish in body, mind and spirit. This human drive often draws on the power of hope and faith, which are reflected and manifested in many of the objects Kiefer documents. The exhibition invites reflection on what it means to possess and what it means to lose, and what it means to belong: how we define who is included and who is excluded, how we distinguish between the sacred and the ordinary, and how those boundaries are enforced.