Pescaditos
When photographer Kim Reierson returned to her native Bolivia and visited the graves of her grandparents, she befriended the children who make their living tending the cemetery- watering flowers, polishing lapideries, and praying over graves for a few pesos. She saw this as a microcosm of the greater problem of child poverty in Bolivia where 800,000 children are forced to work to survive.
Pescaditos (Little Fish) is a documentary featuring three of these kids, Juan Carlos, Henry, and the eponymous Pescadito, as they describe their work. The film features the hauntingly beautiful music by Luzmila Carpio and the poetry of Federico Garcia Lorca.
Pescaditos is a dreamlike evocation of the struggles of poor children while illuminating the religious and indigenous beliefs of the people of Bolivia. Filmed over a two separate 10 year period; bw silent film was shot in 1987 while at attending UCSB and color footage was filmed in 1997.
Born to a Bolivian mother and a North American father, Kim Reierson spent her first six years growing up in Cochabamba , Bolivia. She learned first hand about the debilitating effects of poverty on children. When she was eleven she moved to California, where the relative affluence served only to reinforce the apparent inequities of the world. She worked in Geneva after high school, taking care of two children, and perfecting her French. She returned to the states and studied at UC Santa Barbara, graduating with a BA in Fine Arts. She worked at the Santa Barbara Independent Newspaper as a photojournalist and photo editor for five years. During this time she was active in a local big sister program and worked with the Santa Barbara Museum of Art to develope an art history guideline book for kids in the 5th and 6th grades. She moved to New York City to pursue her commercial and fine art photography. She is represented in New York by the Robin Rice Gallery.