Alejandra Ortiz at the Melkweg

Published on 17 August 2022

Lees dit artikel in het Nederlands

Author, researcher and Red Insight contributor Alejandra Ortiz has several important projects happening at the moment. She has a book coming out and right now, you can see her collaborative exhibition ‘I went on a holiday to the country you fled from’ at the Melkweg in Amsterdam.

Born and raised in a small village in Mexico, Alejandra had to flee the country as it is unsafe for trans women. She arrived in the Netherlands seven years ago, but her safety eludes her yet; the Dutch government refuses to grant her a residence permit and she is being asked to leave. To highlight the uncertain situation she and many other migrants find themselves in, Alejandra worked together with Dutch documentary photographer Iris Haverkamp Begemann to create this multimedia project.

Iris is a Dutch white cis woman, with free access throughout Europe and an unrestrained ability to travel safely in Mexico. She went on a physical journey, based on Alejandra’s written personal recollections of the country and family she was forced to leave behind. Utilising her privileges, Iris used her camera to serve as a bridge between Alejandra’s present-day and her history.

At its core it’s a project built on trust between these two women, and this trust extends to us, the public. Visitors are given not only intimate portraits of the people and places of Alejandra’s youth, but are also entrusted with the frank and honest memories and reflections that accompany each image. Alejandra’s words weave a captivating story, one marked by generational hurt, gendered violence and rejection, but also distinct beauty and aspiration.

Alejandra has been applying for a residence permit since she came to the Netherlands, but the Dutch Immigration and Naturalisation Service (IND) has continuously denied her request, as it considers Mexico safe. A rejection letter from the IND is given a prominent space in the exhibition; its clinical language stands in stark juxtaposition to the deeply personal photos and words one sees filling the space around it.

The letter, difficult to decipher in its bureaucratic language, is further made incomprehensible as it has been placed under a speaker that spills words of rejection spoken by a sea of voices. This installation ties the projects personal level to a public one; the topic of migration and its restriction, of access and its denial - and who we chose to grant access to the places we have outlined with borders, places built on exclusion.

The exhibition ‘I went on a holiday to the country you fled from’ is running from the 15^th of July until the 21^st of august 2022. An online version of the exhibition can also be viewed here.

Alejandra’s book 'The Truth Will Set Me Free’ will be published by Lebowski Publishers in October 2022.

Photos by Red Insight.

Cat Astrophe

Cat is a semi-retired stripper, an illustrator and a lover of all things femme. She does Art Direction for Red Insight and draws romance comics about monsters.