Kossman Design
Thesis Reviews
2007 Winner
David Maple
David Maple was named the winner of the 2007 Kossman Design Thesis Reviews for his project titled “National Exile.”
In October 2006, the United States Congress approved legislation to construct over 700 miles of ‘border wall’ between the United States and Mexico. This wall, already installed in populated border towns, will be asked to stretch across the difficult southern terrain of Texas, New Mexico, Arizona, and California.
While politicians maintain the construction of a border wall can provide the necessary security a country such as the United States requires, one must ask at what cost? Are the inner-city conflicts of multi-cultural integration manifested at our borders and transported by the immigrant to the cities in which they settle? The nation’s preoccupation with fear and anxiety has been attributed to an increase of border presence across the country, both in our airports and our land port entry stations. This insecurity we as a nation suffer from, tangible or perceptive, is influencing the environments we live in. Is this fear and anxiety a characteristic of a post 9-11 world we must come to accept? Or perhaps it is a cyclical phase, one that can only be cured through time.