“Walking Walls”

Figures of the Limit, Figures of the Border

Abstract

A land-art work by Andy Goldworthy presents interesting oximoronic features that apply to American culture. A "walking wall," "flaneur in the wilderness," symbolizes the American soul, nomadic and colonizing at the same time. An analysis of this concept, through some of America's great writers and artists, from the Puritans to Frank L. Wright, leads up to the "mending wall" represented by the 1982 Vietnam Veterans Memorial in Washington, recognized as "The Wall," a surface where life and death comfort one another.