Mesa Verde

Christian Rossipal’s ‘Mesa Verde’ gives former film student Mohamed X space to reflect on his four-year confinement in a California detention centre. Prohibited from filming inside the opaque system, he recounts organising a labour strike against the one dollar/day daily pay and a brutal hunger strike, revealing the unimaginable realities of immigration detention. Readings by Honduran poet Claudia Torres weave Mohamed’s story into the larger history and web of people affected by the modern United States border regime. While recent and highly-publicised events involving ICE (U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement) appear exceptionally violent, they are a part of a long history and permanent state of exclusion.