Any traveler or nomad is considered to be almost a sacred figure in the steppe. First, because distances between settlements have always been vast, empty, unknowable and dangerous; and second, because for those living in the countryside these people were often the only connection with the “larger land”, with the world, the current times.

In these times of wireless Internet, it seemed that there was no longer any need or place for such messengers – but we have been proven wrong.

In the spring of 2021, we traveled to the border of West and East Turkestan, the border of two empires, to link them through audio messages from people all over the world connected to this place – the homeland of the Uyghur people.

We played all the voices through a speaker and videotaped it as proof that borders have always been and will always be contingent. But human words, human grief, human love are not.