Artist unveils arresting image at border wall
TECATE, San Diego County — A photo of a giant toddler stands in Mexico and peers over a steel wall dividing the country from the U.S.
The boy appears to grip the barrier with his fingers, leaving the impression the entire thing could be toppled with a giggle.
A French artist who goes by the moniker JR erected the cutout of the boy named Kikito that stands 65 feet tall.
He has done other largescale portraits around the world, with much of his recent work focused on immigrants and refugees.
JR told reporters at this week’s unveiling of the portrait that he was spurred by a dream in which he imagined a child looking over the border wall.
“And when I woke up, I wondered: ‘What was he thinking?’” he said. “Like for us we know the implication, what it represents, how it divides, but for a kid, I didn’t have the answer.”
The unveiling in Tecate, about 40 miles southeast of San Diego, came the same week President Trump said he would end a program that has allowed young immigrants who were brought to America illegally as children to remain in the country.
The administration also accepted more proposals for its plans to build a continuous wall along the nearly 2,000mile border.
JR said he did not intend for the project in Tecate to coincide with the news about the young immigrants program.
Instead, he said it is part of his long-term work to highlight the “Ellis Islands of today,” which has taken him from the shores of Italy where migrants have been arriving by boat from Africa to the California desert.
“Now as an artist I think that it’s amazing that the piece arrived at a moment when it creates more dialogue,” he said about the boy in Mexico. “Because the idea itself is to raise more questions.”
For artists and activists, the 650 miles of existing wall and fencing between the U.S. and Mexico has long been a blank canvas.
Musicians have played simultaneously on both sides. A giant wooden Trojan-style horse was once parked near a crossing in Tijuana. There have been volleyball games and church services held simultaneously on each side of the border.
Sections of wall on the Mexican side are painted with everything from butterflies to an upside-down American flag.