Loading

Homemade Flotation Device, Brownsville, Texas

Susan Harbage Page2008

Nasher Museum of Art at Duke University

Nasher Museum of Art at Duke University
Durham, United States

In 2007, Susan Harbage Page began photographing objects left behind by migrants crossing the US-Mexico border between Matamoros, Mexico, and Brownsville, Texas, and west to Laredo and Eagle Pass, Texas. These three photographs from the series capture empty cartons, a lone sock, and discarded plastic bags, as well as the vacant trails and passageways once traveled by migrants. Harbage Page photographs the various personal belongings unmoved from the positions in which they have fallen to the ground, integrated into landscapes of departure and arrival, of loss and gain. These items testify to lives that have moved on, and remind viewers of the things that may have been left behind, such as family, friends, and home. They serve as souvenirs of the past as well as symbols of hope for the future. In contemplating the absent owner, the viewer is left to wonder about the rest of the story, the before and after, only hinted at by the scraps that remain.

Show lessRead more
  • Title: Homemade Flotation Device, Brownsville, Texas
  • Creator: Susan Harbage Page
  • Creator Birth Place: Greenville, Ohio
  • Date Created: 2008
  • Location: Nasher Museum of Art at Duke University
  • Physical Dimensions: 42 x 42 inches (106.7 x 106.7 cm)
  • Type: Photograph
  • Publisher: Nasher Museum of Art at Duke University
  • Rights: © Susan Harbage Page
  • Medium: Archival pigment print
  • Art Form: Photography
  • Credit Line: Collection of the Nasher Museum of Art at Duke University, Durham, North Carolina. Gift of the artist in honor of Kimberly Jenkins.
Nasher Museum of Art at Duke University

Get the app

Explore museums and play with Art Transfer, Pocket Galleries, Art Selfie, and more

Home
Discover
Play
Nearby
Favorites