Juarez
Deborah Weir
Rolling Hills Estates, California
The women in Juarez, Mexico, walk alone at night from their places of work (maquiladoras) on usually unpaved roads trying to reach home safely. There are no street lights, no safe public transportation. The electricity in Juarez is used to run the factories, not to help get the workers home, in spite of the dangers. The Sonoran desert would be the ideal location for solar/wind power which could inexpensively and efficiently provide energy desperately needed to illuminate the streets for these women.
Hundreds of such women have been raped and murdered; some disappeared. This is all in the service of cheap labor to produce products for international markets.
The underlying image of the piece is an abstract I created of a city map of Juarez where it meets the U.S. border. This is the “ground” fabric into which I have appliquéd and stitched the prayers and the blood of the women who have been attacked.
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