Voices in the Shadow Book Launch
October 3, 2021 1pm EST
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Between February and April 2021, members of Border Patrol co-organized an exhibition called "Voices in the Shadow" with Mesa Verde residents Levi Cruz, Walter Cruz-Zavala, and William Nickel. The exhibition featured much of the contents of this book alongside video interviews, hand-made objects and a small abolitionist library. It made public for the first time the detainees' activist work in support of better living conditions and documented the abysmal food served inside the facility. Part catalogue and part archive, this book contains letters, portraits, recipes, and exhibition images related to Border Patrol's ongoing collaboration with detainees at the Mesa Verde ICE Processing Center in Bakersfield, CA.
Fifty copies of the limited edition book were made available to the public beginning October 1, 2021 during SPACE's First Friday reception. An additional fifty copies are available for purchase online beginning October 15, 2021. Proceeds will benefit the current and former residents of Mesa Verde. Voices in the Shadow is presented as part of SPACE's exhibition, What Rhymes with Freedom? in conjunction with Freedom & Captivity: A Humanities Initiative for an Abolitionist Future. Click here to access the Freedom & Captivity Abolition Resource List for further reading. |
Transcript of Levi Cruz Interview regarding events on October 3, 2021:
"Hi, my name is Levi Cruz, and I’m one of the co-organizers of the book Voices in the Shadow. First off, I want to apologize for what happened last weekend, which was on Sunday [October 3]…you know, I guess that ICE found out that, uh, not only ICE, but the GEO administration found out about this book and then…so pretty much, they intercepted the phone call, and um, well…they came in right at the time that I was in the middle of starting to have the interview, and so they took us to chow hall and you know, they kinda went through my stuff looking for the book, which I had given to somebody so they wouldn’t find it…so, um, honestly, this was a retaliation…and you know, it sucks cause I was really looking forward to expressing myself to you guys and, you know, answering a lot of questions, but uh…here we are, about a week later, and I hope you guys understand the situation…
“Well, like I said, I’m 27 years old, I’ve been in jail for a very long time, and you guys read my story, so you kinda know a little bit of myself…pretty much my goal in here at Mesa Verde, since I came here, I try to help as many people as I can…there’s a lot of people that don’t speak English, so I take my time to help them out…not only translating, but I help them as far as filling out their court papers, or…whatever questions they have. And um… I’ve been in this facility for almost two years, and um… I have participated in multiple hunger strikes…trying to get the situation in here better, and right now… GEO supposedly is on a budget, and now they don’t want to give us our money… We work for a dollar every day, and they expect us to do this for free, and pretty much we’ve been on like a labor strike, and they’ve been coming in here… [inaudible]… pretty much what’s going on right now is that they’re mad…[inaudible] cause we just worry about our bunk or our general area, and they do the rest, and so… yeah there’s a lot of things going on, and… we’re kinda like in a frustrating situation, you know…
“I wish I could answer… I know you guys had a lot of questions for me, and I wish I could answer them, but going back to that right, everybody that participated in the book, for the most part they’re still here, and along with Elizabeth and Jared, I think we did a good job… and everybody right here, participating in this book, they’re very cool people, I’m glad I got to work with them and work on this book together… Mr. Salvador [Moncada] spends a lot of time doing his drawings… you know, Mr. Mousa, Mohammed Mousa, he spent a lot of time on this book too, and I mean, I hope you guys enjoy it, and like I said… I want to apologize for what happened last weekend, and hopefully we get another opportunity for speaking in the future, and keeping sharing the art, and keep sharing our stories… and that’s it, I appreciate you guys for taking the time, looking at our art, sharing our stories, and I really want to thank you guys.”
Click to download the audio file: levi_cruz_oct_3_2021.mp4
"Hi, my name is Levi Cruz, and I’m one of the co-organizers of the book Voices in the Shadow. First off, I want to apologize for what happened last weekend, which was on Sunday [October 3]…you know, I guess that ICE found out that, uh, not only ICE, but the GEO administration found out about this book and then…so pretty much, they intercepted the phone call, and um, well…they came in right at the time that I was in the middle of starting to have the interview, and so they took us to chow hall and you know, they kinda went through my stuff looking for the book, which I had given to somebody so they wouldn’t find it…so, um, honestly, this was a retaliation…and you know, it sucks cause I was really looking forward to expressing myself to you guys and, you know, answering a lot of questions, but uh…here we are, about a week later, and I hope you guys understand the situation…
“Well, like I said, I’m 27 years old, I’ve been in jail for a very long time, and you guys read my story, so you kinda know a little bit of myself…pretty much my goal in here at Mesa Verde, since I came here, I try to help as many people as I can…there’s a lot of people that don’t speak English, so I take my time to help them out…not only translating, but I help them as far as filling out their court papers, or…whatever questions they have. And um… I’ve been in this facility for almost two years, and um… I have participated in multiple hunger strikes…trying to get the situation in here better, and right now… GEO supposedly is on a budget, and now they don’t want to give us our money… We work for a dollar every day, and they expect us to do this for free, and pretty much we’ve been on like a labor strike, and they’ve been coming in here… [inaudible]… pretty much what’s going on right now is that they’re mad…[inaudible] cause we just worry about our bunk or our general area, and they do the rest, and so… yeah there’s a lot of things going on, and… we’re kinda like in a frustrating situation, you know…
“I wish I could answer… I know you guys had a lot of questions for me, and I wish I could answer them, but going back to that right, everybody that participated in the book, for the most part they’re still here, and along with Elizabeth and Jared, I think we did a good job… and everybody right here, participating in this book, they’re very cool people, I’m glad I got to work with them and work on this book together… Mr. Salvador [Moncada] spends a lot of time doing his drawings… you know, Mr. Mousa, Mohammed Mousa, he spent a lot of time on this book too, and I mean, I hope you guys enjoy it, and like I said… I want to apologize for what happened last weekend, and hopefully we get another opportunity for speaking in the future, and keeping sharing the art, and keep sharing our stories… and that’s it, I appreciate you guys for taking the time, looking at our art, sharing our stories, and I really want to thank you guys.”
Click to download the audio file: levi_cruz_oct_3_2021.mp4
Border Patrol would like to thank Alan Estigoy, Elezar Calmo, Elodio Valencia, Abadín Hector, Jaswant Singh, John Victorio, José Mauricio Enriquez, Levi Cruz, Mohamed Mousa, Nestor Chavez, Ordaz Camacho, Osvin Orozco-García, Mark Griffin, Quan Lam, Roberto Ramirez Piñeda, Salvador Moncada, Walter Cruz-Zavala, Wei Lin, William Alexander Matias and WIlliam Nickel for their participation and continued collaboration.
We also wish to thank New Country (Bakersfield, CA) and SOIL (Seattle, WA) for opening their galleries to exhibitions of this work and to SPACE (Portland, ME) for the funding that made this publication possible. Design assistance was provided by Douglas W. Milliken and exhibition documentation by Alex de la Pena.
We also wish to thank New Country (Bakersfield, CA) and SOIL (Seattle, WA) for opening their galleries to exhibitions of this work and to SPACE (Portland, ME) for the funding that made this publication possible. Design assistance was provided by Douglas W. Milliken and exhibition documentation by Alex de la Pena.