
Zoe Leonard
A flowing river is also a body bearing witness. Over the past five years, Zoe Leonard has followed a river with two names: Río Bravo and Rio Grande, photographed over a stretch of 1,900 miles along the border of the United States and Mexico. The series also has two names, “Al río / To the River,” and comprises over five hundred black-and-white silver gelatin prints and approximately fifty color C-prints, with the selection here titled “A View from the Levee.” A sensitive exploration of the ideology of Manifest Destiny that captivated early American photographers—the idea that nature’s splendor