Under today's current border control rhetoric the New York Times challenged thirteen architects, landscape architects, and planners to consider the border zone between Mexico and the United States. related
Instead of challenging the architects to add to the fence, give extra advantageous purposes, beautify, make more dynamic, etc. (which ultimately only submits to the inevitability of a fence), why couldn’t the NYT have challenged them to come up with absolute alternatives? Challenge the very notion of the fence itself? What if, not only the fence is realized as the total non-solution that it is (IMHO), but architects helped to prove that other projects instead, unassuming, could provide far better solutions instead? I am with Norten when he says the economy of Mexico and its infrastructure with the U.S. as a partner is the future of the solution, and the border urbanism there should embrace that, should initiate that. EOM spoke about the wall creating a “third culture†by using the project to merge the two from both sides. However, that “third culture†is already there, and so why not let them be the leaders or ‘designers’ of this region themselves? Why not bring the border culture and cooperative border communities’ input to the forefront? I dig his incorporation of the tunnels, but I am not sure about highlighting the border as a demarcation seen from space. Light, solar energy and enterprise zones sound nice and all, but the boundary should become increasingly more ambiguous and incorporated through out both sides I believe rather than pronounced as a symbol of separation (even if the overall projects seeks to merge the sides diplomatically).
But, foremost, shouldn’t architects be exploring the alternatives to a fence? Use their creative problem solving for that, rather than to bolster or legitimize the fence in some additional clever ways? Don’t these projects just further justify the rhetoric for a fence?
I guess it depends on which side of the fence you stand on….. But again, even in those terms, should we even be referring to the issue from ‘a side of the fence’? fence is in our language, in our ways of seeing. How to do away with the fence (the need for a fence) literally and metaphorically?
Ok, I am ranting – but, any thoughts?
Antoine Predock, based in Albuquerque, "dematerialized" the fence, he explained, with a physical wall designed as a mirage. An earthwork of rammed, tilted dirt would be pushed into place by Mexican day laborers. Crushed rock scattered before it, and heated from below, would appear to lift it off the ground, in the way that heat in the desert appears to make objects hover, like mirages.
"There would be confusion about the materiality of the wall," Mr. Predock explained. "It would discourage you from crossing, but the message from both sides would be one of good will."
"Ich bin ein Berliner". followed closely by (in the span of history) "Mr. Gorbachev, tear down this wall!"
The Soviets tried to keep their comrades inside.
The Chinese tried to keep out the Mongols.
Hadrian tried to keep out the Barbarians.
Japan closed itself to the west and killed anyone who visited. While not a wall in the physical sense, it was just as effective.
What each of these societies tried to do was to prevent the infiltration of outside influence from turning the political and social order against the ruling class. If you look closely at the rationale for building these walls, Physical security was a ruse for isolationism.
In 1852 Commodore Perry under orders of President Fillmore sailed into Nagasaki and opened trade between the US and Japan in much the same way one opens an oyster. By driving a knife down its throat.
Scratch one wall.
In 1963 President Kennedy came to the wall and delivered his famous speech as that wall was reaching new heights.
In 1987 President Regan’s came to the wall and delivered his historic speech, marking the beginning of the end of the wall.
Scratch another wall.
19 years later another American president is again at the fence. This time to build a wall.
Once again the ruse of security is being used to rationalize the expense of building such an elaborate device who’s real purpose is to distract people from the misguided policies of a presidency that has been filled with missteps.
Scratch this wall!
Another famous quote comes to mind that I feel sums up not only this issue but most of what the current military and political morass is all about. “Pay no attention to the man behind the curtainâ€.
Clint Newton III
Jun 20, 06 10:49 am ·
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Instead of challenging the architects to add to the fence, give extra advantageous purposes, beautify, make more dynamic, etc. (which ultimately only submits to the inevitability of a fence), why couldn’t the NYT have challenged them to come up with absolute alternatives? Challenge the very notion of the fence itself? What if, not only the fence is realized as the total non-solution that it is (IMHO), but architects helped to prove that other projects instead, unassuming, could provide far better solutions instead? I am with Norten when he says the economy of Mexico and its infrastructure with the U.S. as a partner is the future of the solution, and the border urbanism there should embrace that, should initiate that. EOM spoke about the wall creating a “third culture†by using the project to merge the two from both sides. However, that “third culture†is already there, and so why not let them be the leaders or ‘designers’ of this region themselves? Why not bring the border culture and cooperative border communities’ input to the forefront? I dig his incorporation of the tunnels, but I am not sure about highlighting the border as a demarcation seen from space. Light, solar energy and enterprise zones sound nice and all, but the boundary should become increasingly more ambiguous and incorporated through out both sides I believe rather than pronounced as a symbol of separation (even if the overall projects seeks to merge the sides diplomatically).
But, foremost, shouldn’t architects be exploring the alternatives to a fence? Use their creative problem solving for that, rather than to bolster or legitimize the fence in some additional clever ways? Don’t these projects just further justify the rhetoric for a fence?
I guess it depends on which side of the fence you stand on….. But again, even in those terms, should we even be referring to the issue from ‘a side of the fence’? fence is in our language, in our ways of seeing. How to do away with the fence (the need for a fence) literally and metaphorically?
Ok, I am ranting – but, any thoughts?
I started a discussion thread on this article...hopefully some people will start posting there...
"There would be confusion about the materiality of the wall," Mr. Predock explained. "It would discourage you from crossing, but the message from both sides would be one of good will."
tony goodwill... go tony go
how bizarre!
.
"Ich bin ein Berliner". followed closely by (in the span of history) "Mr. Gorbachev, tear down this wall!"
The Soviets tried to keep their comrades inside.
The Chinese tried to keep out the Mongols.
Hadrian tried to keep out the Barbarians.
Japan closed itself to the west and killed anyone who visited. While not a wall in the physical sense, it was just as effective.
What each of these societies tried to do was to prevent the infiltration of outside influence from turning the political and social order against the ruling class. If you look closely at the rationale for building these walls, Physical security was a ruse for isolationism.
In 1852 Commodore Perry under orders of President Fillmore sailed into Nagasaki and opened trade between the US and Japan in much the same way one opens an oyster. By driving a knife down its throat.
Scratch one wall.
In 1963 President Kennedy came to the wall and delivered his famous speech as that wall was reaching new heights.
In 1987 President Regan’s came to the wall and delivered his historic speech, marking the beginning of the end of the wall.
Scratch another wall.
19 years later another American president is again at the fence. This time to build a wall.
Once again the ruse of security is being used to rationalize the expense of building such an elaborate device who’s real purpose is to distract people from the misguided policies of a presidency that has been filled with missteps.
Scratch this wall!
Another famous quote comes to mind that I feel sums up not only this issue but most of what the current military and political morass is all about. “Pay no attention to the man behind the curtainâ€.
Clint Newton III
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