DEMO the house

The U.S. Mexico border has been a personal place of investigation over the past 3 years.  The notion of frontiers and how they organize countries and identities.  The border as a constant construction site, war ground, which facilitates the movement of goods, services and people.  Moving into thesis I felt if I was carrying too much baggage, too many old ideas and writings, to be able to actually produce an architectural project.  I want to be sensitive to the issues at hand, yet be free enough to reveal new creative projections about what could be.  


That being said, I was hesitant with my House as Thesis proposal as there was no physical structure proposed.  Rather it looked at the system of trails and the movement of people across the border.  Conversation revealed working within the structure of the trails as a kind of architecture.  Probing at the global scale of human migration, both voluntary and involuntary.  This kind of investigation also requires a new way of viewing SITE- its expansions, whether it exists in the physical ground or the digital or the experiential, and what the architectural response to the site should be.  


next build: consider the rest stop/ look at global migration and the moving site. 


method of building: the line (drawing)

THE DEMO SET

Open_House

Opening Thesis Gambit

War & Periphery

Space and Power: Politics, War, and Architecture by Paul Hirst

Chapter 4

war |wôr|

noun

“War existed before recorded history and organized states. Almost all societies have engaged in some form of combat against others. This does not imply that war is ‘natural,’ whatever that means…” p.51

• a state of armed conflict between different nations or states or different groups within a nation or state

• a state of competition, conflict, or hostility between different people or groups.

• a sustained effort to deal with or end a particular unpleasant or undesirable situation or condition

• Is an organized pursuit of interest by means of force

• Involves violence, but nor necessarily anger

• Is a conduct

• Is not a game

• Is a constant in human affairs

“Fighting may be episodic, but the possibility of conflict is constant.” P.51

“Space is not just a ‘container’ for war, an abstract coordinate system in which conflict just happens. Space is shaped in complex and qualitative ways by circumstances, and in turn its specific features condition and shape war.” P.52

periphery |pəˈrifərē|

noun ( pl. -eries)

• the outer limits or edge of an area or object

• a marginal or secondary position in, or part or aspect of, a group, subject, or sphere of activity

No More Deaths- Update

In 2008 a ranger on Buenos Aires Wildlife Refuge ticketed a humanitarian aid worker for littering as he left water gallons along the deadly migrant trails in the Southern Arizona Desert.  Finally, two years later his case has been overturned.  Read the update below for more details.



FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Contact: Adam Aguirre (520) 240-1641 daytime or evening
Dan Millis (928) 921-0331 daytime or evening

September 2, 2010

Las Vegas, NV- In a 2-1 decision the United States 9th Circuit Court of Appeals today overturned the conviction of a humanitarian activist for “littering” near the U.S. border with Mexico, stating that the clean bottles of drinking water placed on known migrant trails could not be considered “garbage” due to their intended purpose of preventing death-by-exposure.

Dan Millis, a volunteer with the faith-based organization No More Deaths, had been convicted in September 2008 for placing such water in the Buenos Aires National Wildlife Refuge (BANWR), in the middle of one of the highest corridors of death along the Arizona border.

In response to today’s ruling Millis stated “I continue to be saddened by the ongoing tragedy along the border; but I am pleased and relieved that the Court has finally made clear that humanitarian aid is never a crime.”

On February 22, 2008 – two days after finding the body of a 14-year-old girl from El Salvador – Millis became the first humanitarian to be ticketed for littering near the border. In the months that followed his conviction refuge officials ticketed seventeen additional volunteers for attempting to provide water on BANWR. Although sixteen of these cases were later dropped, No More Deaths volunteer Walt Staton was convicted of a more severe littering charge in August 2009.

This year alone more than 214 human remains have been recovered from the southern Arizona desert, putting 2010 on track to be the deadliest year on record along the Arizona / Mexico border. Last month, BANWR officials rejected a permit request from No More Deaths and Samaritans to legally place water at designated sites on the wildlife refuge. This permit application had been negotiated with refuge managers during the course of the previous year, and they had provisionally agreed to its content. Officials have refused to permit new water stations on the Buenos Aires National Wildlife Refuge since 2001.

For more information, please visit  www.nomoredeaths.org, write us at media@nomoredeaths.org, or call (520) 240-1641

City & Decay

Space and Power: Politics, War, and Architecture by Paul Hirst

Chapter 2

“The largest cities in the world, the true megafauna of modern urbanism, are anti-cities – if we consider the city as above all an effective political institution. Sao Paulo, Cairo and Lagos are in one sense the future of modern urbanism: sprawling chaotic cities full of shanty dwellers. Their very growth, driven by uncontrolled rural migration, renders them ungovernable. They represent a Third World version of exurbanism: they are also decentred and post-public. When we consider the future of the city, we have to bear in mind that most urban dwellers on the planet will no live in stable civic environments. Architects and planners are prone to taking particular cities, such as Las Angeles or Las Vegas, as models of the future of urbanism. Perhaps we should see Cairo as more typical of the future, in the sense that such cities will be the largest and fastest growing on the planet.” P.25

city |ˈsitē|

“Cities are not just large towns. The city can only be fully understood as a political institution. It is defined by its role in governance. As an institution it has a substantial degree of political autonomy and a salient role in political and social life.” P.9

“The city is identifies with freedom. As Aristotle says, the citizens govern and are governed in turn.” P.9

“Cities have always had hinterlands. The concept of the ‘city’ has never been exclusively urban, but involved a specific relation between town and country.” P.11

• a large town

• a political institution married with the state

decay |diˈkā|

verb

• (of organic matter) rot or decompose through the action of bacteria and fungi

• (of a building or area) fall into disrepair; deteriorate

• decline in quality, power, or vigor

• Physics (of a radioactive substance, particle, etc.) undergo change to a different form by emitting radiation

• technical (of a physical quantity) undergo a gradual decrease