Alex Webb (Magnum): Crossings

Overview

Alex Webb has spent 25 years photographing the 2000-mile-long US-Mexico border, making several unsuccessful attempts to make the crossing with Mexican migrants that have ended in arrest by US border patrol.

Crossings displays photographs from these arrests but also images from the borderland itself where the two countries and cultures meet. This 10-mile-wide area has its own unique mix of American and Mexican culture and is full of transient people, all on their way to 'the other side'... from Mexico to the United States or vice versa. Webb's images provide a realistic insight into an area that has become a romanticised borderland in pop culture and a cause celebre for conservative immigration and race politics in the United States.