Education
2006 – 2010
Goldsmiths, London: Visual Anthropology PhD
Thesis – “Making Memory in a Megalopolis: A photographic ethnography of the daily life of cemeteries
in Mexico City”
2004 – 2006
Goldsmiths, London: Visual Anthropology MRes
Thesis – “Socialising the Dead: Mexico’s Monumental bodies and Deadscapes”
Research areas: Michoacan, Veracruz, Puebla, Oaxaca and Mexico D.F.
1993 – 1995
The School of Oriental and African Studies, London: Social Anthropology MA
Thesis – “Historical and ethnographic perspectives of photographic internal and external Worlds”
1990 – 1993
The London College of Printing, London: Photography BA (Hons)
Thesis – “The Symbiosis of Photography and Anthropology”
Research project with the Mapuche community in Chile and final dissertation with the Waso Booranas in Kenya.
Group Exhibitions
2018
The Beloved, Treasure Hill Artist Village, Taipei, Taiwan.
2013
Visual research in the cemeteries of Mexico City: Photography, a social research method. ‘Photography as a research method’, ‘IUAES 2013 Congress’. (5-10 August, University of Manchester)
2008
‘isiones Sobre La Muerte, VI Festival Internacional del Día de los Muertos in Mexico City, Paris, Oxford, N.Y., Las Palmas de Gran Canaria and Cairo.
2007
Zapotecs of Yayee. Death in African History Conference, CRASSH, Cambridge.
1992
The Waso Booranas. Group exhibition, London College of Printing, London. Zapotecs of Chile, Latin American Festival, Vauxhall, London.
Solo Exhibitions
2019
Chronicles of Dreams (夢遊), 票人票畫空間 | Piao Piao Gallery, Taipei, Taiwan
2018
Installation: The Altar - I love you Abuelita (I love you my dearest Grandmother), Treasure Hill Artist Village, Taipei, Taiwan
1994
The lost path of Waqqa, Light of the Word Gallery, Chicago, USA.
1993
The lost path of Waqqa, The Barbican Centre, London.
Conferences, Exhibitions and Workshops
Upcoming
2018
- International Artist in Residence. Treasure Hill Artist Village. (Oct-Dec, Taipei, Taiwan)
- Conference Director. 2nd International Conference: Photography and Academic Research: Images in Post Truth Era. (6-8 Sept, Birkbeck, London)
2016
Conference Director. International Conference: Photography and Academic Research. (8-9 Sept, UCL, Institute of Archaeology (Heritage Studies), London)
2015
Photography in social research and writing - warsztaty
Workshop and master-class, organised by the Institute of Ethnology and Cultural Anthropology, University of Warsaw and Stowarzyszenie “Pracownia Etnograficzna”.
2013
Curated exhibition and panel; Photography as a research method, ‘IUAES 2013 Congress’. (5-10 August, University of Manchester)
Selected talks
2014
Memorialising and Commemorating the dead in Mexico City, Research Seminar, Royal Anthropological Institute. (31 Oct, London)
My grandmother is not a corpse: The human rights for the dead. (11 Feb, University of Sussex)
2013
Material culture, magic and the Santa Muerte in the cemeteries of Mexico City. (14 Nov, LSE)
Publications
Upcoming publication
- 'Photography and the sociomythic portrait: Extending the bonds between the living and the dead', Раздел 3, pp105-125, from the conference: What do we talk about when we talk photography? At the National Research University, Higher School of Economics, Faculty of Philosophy, 11-13 декабря 2014, ГУ-ВШЭ , Москва, Россия.
2013
- 'Maintaining the dead in the lives of the living: Material culture and photography in the cemeteries of Mexico City', in Envisaging Death: Visual Culture and Dying, Michele Aaron (edt), pp26-49, Cambridge: Cambridge Scholars Publishing.
2012
- ‘Living with the dead: Cremating and reburying the dead in a megalopolis’, in The presence of the dead in our lives, Nate Hinerman and Julia A Glahn (eds), Vol 82, pp. 139-164, Rodopi, Amsterdam, NY.
- ‘Dancing with the dead in San Juan Yaeé’, in Relations between Image and Death: Anachronism, presence, absence. Revista Sans Soleil, ISSN (ed. digital): 2014-1874, http://revista-sanssoleil.com/, http://revista-sanssoleil.com/multimedia4/, Spain.
- ‘Extending current boundaries between the private, domestic and public display of mourning, love and visual culture in Mexico City’, in Social History, (May, Routledge), pp. 117-141.
- ‘Magic and material culture in the cemeteries of a megalopolis’, Visible Religions, in Culture and Religion: An Interdisciplinary Journal, (March, Routledge), pp. 107-131.
2010
- ‘Communicating with the Dead: Social Visibility in the Cemeteries of Mexico City’, in Die Realität des Todes: Zum gegenwärtigen Wandel von Totenbildern und Erinnerungskulturen (Visibility of Death) by Dominik Groß, Christoph Schweikardt (Edts), pp.33-62, Frankfurt: Campus Verlag.
2009
- ‘Bailando con las ánimas de San Juan de Yaye’, in Cuartoscuro. Nov/Dec, Vol 98, pp.32-37, Mexico D.F.
2007
- ‘What happens when a language dies? Balaa Xtee Guech Gulal: Shadow of the old town’, in ‘SWINDLE’, issue 13, Death and Fame, USA (photographic essay).
1994
- ‘The Lost Path of Waqqa. Art and Culture. An exhibition of photographs by Marcel Reyes- Cortez’, in the New African, London.
- ‘Drought Without Frontiers’, in Divine Word Missionaries, Vol. XXXVI, Number 2, San Francisco.
- ‘Lost Path of Waqqa’, in The Photographic Journal. The Royal Photographic Society. Vol 134, number 3, UK.
Social documentary projects and other work experience
2004 The Zapotects of Yayee, documentary of a Zapotect community in Oaxaca, Mexico.
2003 One dream, six lives, female migrants in London, ethnographic project, UK.
1998 APA, Visual recording of daily life in Jerusalem, Israel.
1997 APA, Visual recording of the making of Havana cigars, Cuba.
1993 CAFOD, Field research with the Waso Boorana community, North East Kenya.
1992 CAFOD, Field research with the Mapuche community, Chile.
1989 – 1991 The Universe Newspaper, monthly coverage of religious festivities and celebrations.
Memberships
The Royal Anthropological Institute
The Association for the Study of Death and Society
European Association of Social Anthropologist
American Anthropological Association
Society for Visual Anthropology
The Association of Photographers
The Royal Photographic Society
