A $10,000 award is granted to the Argentinean filmmakers Loreley Unamuno and Malena Bystrowicz for their project Migrantas (Migrant Women)

PROJECT DESCRIPTION

Twelve years ago, Maria left her rough mining region in Bolivia and traveled to Buenos Aires. Her plan was to work for six months to save money, so she left her three young daughters behind. But as the months passed, Maria was caught in a struggle to simply survive in Argentina where, in addition to being poor, she was a foreigner, isolated and homesick.

Lourdes is another Bolivian migrant living in Buenos Aires, survivor of a deadly fire in an illegal clothing factory. “The clothes we wear are stained with blood,” she says. The fire took the lives of four children and a pregnant woman. Lourdes testified in the trial that followed, and she still fights to make sure that those responsible will be held to account.

Ten years after the fire, Blanca started the Copacabana textile cooperative, which she now heads. Sixty women work there, participating in the management, sharing responsibilities and benefits. Working conditions are decent, safe.

Three Bolivian migrant women in Argentina are ready to talk about their years of servitude and abuse. This is their story.