ENVÍO

Subjective Borders: Aesthetic Negotiations of Space on the U.S. Frontier

This project executes a close-reading and textual analysis of ways in which the physical space is (aesthetically) imagined, negotiated, manipulated and (materially or virtually) re-created as a result of the intervention of technology and the merchandising of identity on the U.S. border zone and other territories. The cities of Tijuana (among the most transited & infamous borders of the world), San Juan (Puerto Ricans being the protagonists of the first massive airborne migration), and New York (a metropolis where the Mexican and the Puerto Rican borders meet in the U.S.), will provide a setting for fieldwork-comparison and analysis of the different contours of the U.S. Frontier. Through exploration of these dynamics and their impact on the physical space, I seek to create signifiers which will contribute to the understanding of contemporary border relations and the cultural artifacts they engender. At the intersection of knowledges within these “places” lies a decolonizing writing project, in conversations with broader intellectual endeavors in drawing global designs from local histories.