Geographers describe how “border thinking” establishes the ways in which we—as societies and cultures—isolate ourselves at all scales. When a boundary is strengthened and used to deter people from gaining access, it becomes a violent line from which divisions are born.
This imagined border wall speaks to a place where the interaction between individuals and lived experience create new meaning contributing to and capturing this public narrative.
This project is based on a series of interviews I conducted in the Rio Grande Valley responding to the Mexico-US “barrier”, that challenge the viability of the wall while surveying the “bordered” life of the people on either side of it. Voices include cattle ranchers, minutemen, clergy, border patrol and immigrants, that serve as resource material for the creation of this mural.
Scroll down to watch short clips from the people of the Rio Grande Valley or watch on YouTube.
Texas is separated from Mexico by the Rio Grande River. The heavily populated Rio Grande Valley is at the forefront of the planned border wall, a combination of concrete walls, steel fences and "virtual fencing" designed to stop illegal immigration and smuggling across the river. In this video playlist, proponents both for and against the wall deliver their viewpoints.