• Geoffrey James (photographer)

View of dirt road and dwelling showing a partial view of United States-Mexico border fence, San Diego County, California, United States and Colonia Libertad, Tijuana, Baja California, Mexico

1997

The series "Running Fence 1997" focuses "on the first 14 miles of the border fence that separates the United States and Mexico, beginning at the Pacific Ocean and ending in the Otay Mountains.... [It] analyzes the "idea" of the border and explores its iconography, the border being a subject that is of extreme importance to the public as the world proceeds towards greater globalization. [Geoffrey] James has written of the project: "[The border fence] was built by the US Army Corps of Engineers in 1994, out of recycled metal landing strip - the most visible symbol of what is known as Operation Gatekeeper. Because the steel sheets are placed in the ground so that their ridges run horizontally, a man can hop over the fence with ease; and no Mexican child ever seems to be impeded from retrieving a soccer ball from US territory. The real barrier to illegal immigration from Mexico into the USA is less visible: hundreds of buried sensors linked to a central computer, nightscopes, helicopters and Border Patrol Agents in white Broncos."" (Evans).

Gelatin silver print

comp.: 46.2 x 57.9 cm sheet: 50.7 x 60.6 cm

PH1997:0054

• partial view
• exterior view

- This photograph is attached the CCA mount with four paper corners and white woven tape.

inscribed, dated and signed - by the photographer, in graphite, verso, l.l.: with title; l.c.: with title and "AP"; l.r.: "Geoffrey James"

Colonia Libertad; Tijuana; Baja California; Mexi

• architecture
• ingénierie

• trees
• fence
• roads
• dwellings
• geopolitical boundaries

© Geoffrey James