Interrogating the Line: A Transdisciplinary Collective for Mexico-US Border Research

Teddy Cruz
Visual Arts
UC San Diego

Grant funding supports the development of a platform for transnational artistic collaboration, which highlights and subverts the physicality of the Mexico-U.S. border. Art making in this context serves to catalyze greater dialogue across disciplines in the humanities as we faced the 20 year mark of NAFTA and San Diego. The project includes the production of a digital archive and supports a series of cross-discipline exchanges among researchers, community organizers, and field-based practitioners. Ultimately, we see artistic endeavors as the necessary mediation for a wider range of studies associated with the border region. In this way we open up a platform around which research and dialogue become praxis, transforming the border into a site of possibility and future place-making.