Travel Between The Pages

This week, Chinese dissident artist and human rights activist Ai WeiWei launched a multi-site, crowdfunded project in New York City titled “Good Fences Make Good Neighbors”. The three centerpieces of the project utilize metal fencing materials and are located in Manhattan and Queens. Ai chose the name from the famous Robert Frost poem “Mending Walls” to provoke public reaction in the U.S. to Trump’s plans limiting immigration and for building a ridiculous border wall with Mexico.

The artist, who spent more than a decade during the last century living and working in NYC, pointedly installed a gold-painted, cage-like structure at the southeast corner of Central Park not far from tangerine Mussolini’s personal tower.

The second major installation is a mirrored passageway framed by the monumental Washington Square Arch in Greenwich Village. The powerful piece incorporated the outlines of two human figures embracing.

Located in Queens, the third major component of “Good Fences” is a literal fence that surrounds the Unisphere steel globe that was built for the 1964 New York World’s Fair.

The citywide project will run through February 2018 and also includes dozens of smaller installations around New York’s five boroughs, such as decorated kiosks, lampposts, and bus shelters also highlighting the plight of immigrants.