Tear/tear

Cities and Memory - remixing the world

"Tear/tear is a piece inspired by all the women from the global South who have migrated to the global North, and by the work of the recording’s author, Abril Rios Rivera. As I learned about Abril and her research on migrant women, I started reflecting on my own journey migrating from Colombia to the UK. Her research focuses on understanding what drives women to turn their migration hardships into empowerment. This composition is my answer to this question while honoring the women who have had to forcibly migrate to survive.
"I used multiple methods to process the original recording. I blended field recordings I made back home in Bogotá, Colombia, degraded the sound, synthesized it, and used the pieces to create a new narrative that draws parallels between my own experience and the experiences of the women that Abril has worked with. The aim of this piece is to reflect how much of the migration process involves tearing yourself apart, only to build yourself back as a stronger version. The composition includes a recording of a poem in Spanish that I wrote and now dedicate to them:
"'I crossed the sea through the air and the land through the sea, a sea full of tears collected while they cross the land by land and the sea by sea.'"
Mexico City protest reimagined by Maria Jose Ibarbo Rocha.
Part of the Migration Sounds project, the world’s first collection of the sounds of human migration.
For more information and to explore the project, see https://www.citiesandmemory.com/migration