Birchett Park, Tempe, Arizona

“Open Border”
2005 • ceramic, aluminum • 6’ x 48’ • Tempe, Arizona
"Open Border" addresses the “blurred” area where the university and the city intersect. Thousands of vehicles pass by this area each day and “Open Border” was designed to represent one of the most important aspects to a public university, that it is open to all and that barriers to entrance are minimized to encourage all to participate, there is no barrier to what a person can learn or achieve through education. My piece is designed to dispel the idea of a border between a community and a university – a border that does not actually exist. I involved two local community school groups to help with the installation by selecting and stacking the individual modules that compose the fence posts. By involving local students, additional barriers are bridged – those between the artist and the public and between primary and higher education.

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