Jeoffrey Guillemard

In Mexico they are called the Rastreadoras or Trackers. The Rastreadoras are mothers armed with picks, shovels, sieve who scour the wilderness in search of remains of their sons buried in clandestine burial pits. Drug cartels in various parts of Mexico have deposited victims’ bodies in several mass graves over the years. In Mazatlán, in the state of Sinaloa, a group of women created their own collective after being confronted with the inefficiency of the government to find their missing loved-ones. It was in 2017, in the waiting room of the investigative police station, on her way to report the disappearance of her son, that Irma Arellanes Hernandez met with women who were in the same situation. Together they decided to organize to start searching on their own. Since then with their collective Tesoros Perdidos (The Lost Treasures), they have found about 140 bodies in mass graves in the outskirts of Mazatlán. “Disappeared”. A term that conveniently deflates crime figures: neither dead nor alive. In Mexico, there are currently about 100,000 missing persons, with as many families losing hope every day to finally find the bodies of their loved-ones. This project is part of a long term documentary work focusing on the fate of collateral victims of drug trafficking in Mexico. It was realized with the support of the documentary photography of the CNAP (National Center of Plastic Arts in Paris).