Orinoco - Frontera de agua - (Water Border) is a visual and literary essay by Juanita Escobar featuring various stories and voices from those who have forged a life in this stateless area near the Orinoco River border between Colombia and Venezuela. At the heart of this story are the women: indigenous women (from the Sikuani, Amorúa, Piaroa, Curripaco tribes), Venezuelan, Colombian, and Llaneras (women of the plains). Here, the border becomes a living body bearing the names of the people and places that shape the map of a nameless country: The Orinoco.


Juanita Escobar, a self-taught photographer, was the winner of the Colombian National Photography Prize in 2009 with her work People – Land. She was selected for the World Press Masterclass Latin America 2015 and in 2016 won the Portfolio Review Prize from the National Geographic Society for her 9-year-long body of work, Llano. In 2017 she was selected for the World Press Photo Joop Swart Masterclass and in 2018 was awarded the Magnum Foundation Fund for her project Orinoco, Women’s Journal.