Mujer ángel, Desierto de Sonora, México (Angel woman, Sonora Desert, Mexico),

1979, printed later

This photograph is perhaps Iturbide’s most reproduced image. It was taken in Mexico’s Sonoran desert in 1979, when Iturbide was working on a series about the Seri people for the National Indigenous Institute. “I was in Punta Chueca, near the border with Arizona,” Iturbide has explained. “On the day of this particular image, I went with a group to a cave where there are indigenous paintings. I took just one picture of this woman during the walk there. I call her Mujer Ángel, because she looks as if she could fly off into the desert. She was carrying a tape recorder, which the Seris got from the Americans in exchange for handicrafts such as baskets and carvings.” Iturbide registers the tension between the Seri’s traditional way of life and trans-national modernity—a liminal, itinerant moment that combines the memory of Amerindian nomadism and the circulation and appropriation of modern technology.