Arts & International Affairs: Vol. 4, No. 3, Spring 2020 | Page 18

THE AESTHETICS OF A MOVEABLE BORDER
One of the many recognizable forms of a cinematic time-image was its ability to mix
different temporal zones. In other words, illusions about wars being over, for now, could
be shown to be false by a cinematic sequence that mixed safe, tranquil present-tense time
with dangerous pasts (such as World War II) and dangerous futures (e.g. World War III
and an anticipated nuclear holocaust). The implications of this for borders can be better
understood by situating the time-image within the temporality of borders, replacing a
tranquil present with a dangerous past (previous violence against undocumented immigrants
or legalized theft of Latina/o land in the U.S. Southwest) with a violent future
(deportations of citizens, incarceration of undocumented immigrants). Geographical
zones can be merged within a painting, for example, a mural in an affluent city like San
Francisco that depicts violence in Central America (a dangerous past) and tranquil relations
to the land (a better future). Another example is murals in San Diego that show an
Aztec past. This type of image will be explored.
The time-image does not only rearrange time and space within a cognitive space of creative
media never to be realized in real life. Violence expressed in these artworks is not
simply about the past or the future, but has serious, persistent material implications for
Latina/os emerging from the after-shocks of continuous primitive accumulation that
began in 1848. How can these images challenge primitive accumulation? One way is the
physical presence. Chicano Park in San Diego was a land takeover that took back space
usurped from Chicana/os and still attempts to extend this space. While not entirely successful,
it was granted National Park status thus hopefully protecting communal land.
A few considerations for analysing data flows from the abovementioned theoretical considerations.
First, the sites of borders, and relative commentary on borders, need not be
physically located at the boundaries of nation-states. Consequently, a search for border
art does not have to look to border walls per se. The subsequent priority is not just to
see this as (Amoore and Hall 2010) explain. Rather, the assumptions for collecting data
must assume that locations other than the border, but related to the border, may figure
into protests about the border.
Second, this research is not only about protest at an aesthetic level as in the formation of
pure thought within an individual viewer�as in an orthodox reading of Deleuze. Rather,
this research analyses art that physically occupies space, temporally or permanently.
Within this context, this paper asks what role protest art about borders and sovereignty
can play in: (a) fighting racism; and (b) spatially opposing the material aspects of land
loss due to primitive accumulation, which is a cause of immigration?
Third, this approach to collecting and analysing art attempts to supplement I.R. theory,
Marxist theory, and Deleuzian theory with voices of artists, be they visual or written.
This is “interference” and rests upon the assumption of a radical change of thought based
on exposure to an alternative set of texts�here visual artwork�which would not have
been possible through written academic texts (Deleuze 1989; Toohey 2012). This approach
is an attempt to be mindful of the power imbalances of academic scholarship
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