Mending Wall
Powder-coated rebar and black patina on steel
Variable dimensions
2018 - 2019

Mending Wall is a series of eight grappling hooks, each is designed to overcome a corresponding prototype of President Trump's proposed border wall between the United States and Mexico. The federally funded border wall prototypes were constructed in 2017 in San Diego, California, right across the border from Tijuana, Mexico. While the relationship between the United States and Mexico has rarely been easy, the two countries which share a border have many years of successful bilateral relations. Despite the threat of physical barriers, the two countries are forever entwined-no wall or president will change that.

Eight private companies were commissioned to build the prototypes according to the president’s specifications: big, fat, and beautiful (at least on the side facing the United States). In 2019, the wall sections have been demolished, transforming each object into a memory of the political spectacle that propelled them into existence.

The title is a reference to Robert Frost’s poem “Mending Wall”, which narrates a relationship between two neighbors that meet yearly to repair a wall that divides their property. Linking Frost’s poem with the contemporary issues that these eight grappling hooks represent allows the discussion of divisive global borders both poetically and politically.

The hooks are made from rebar which is needed in the casting of superior concrete/cement structures and they are powder-coated with colors found in native Mexican corn. The exposed welds and the fabrication methods refer back to the labor that went into building the prototypes.