Seesaw art installation seeks to bridge divide at US-Mexico border

In what they've billed as a "unifying act," two California professors installed pink seesaws that reach across the U.S.-Mexico border, allowing children on each side to play with each other.

Credit: Joe Raedle/Getty Images

Credit: Joe Raedle/Getty Images

In what they've billed as a "unifying act," two California professors installed pink seesaws that reach across the U.S.-Mexico border, allowing children on each side to play with each other.

In what they've billed as a "unifying act," two California professors installed pink seesaws that reach across the U.S.-Mexico border, allowing children on each side to play with each other.

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The seesaws went up Monday along the steel border fence separating El Paso, Texas from Ciudad Juárez, Mexico, PEOPLE.com reported. Virginia San Fratello, an associate professor of design at San José State University, originally had the idea for the "Teetertotter Wall" 10 years ago, according to an Instagram post by the other professor behind the project, Ronald Rael.

Rael, a professor of architecture at the University of California, Berkeley, included a video showing children and adults alike playing on the fluorescent seesaws on each side of the border.

"The wall became a literal fulcrum for U.S. - Mexico relations and children and adults were connected in meaningful ways on both sides with the recognition that the actions that take place on one side have a direct consequence on the other side," Rael wrote.

The "Teetertotter Wall" comes amid an ongoing immigration debate that's become central to Donald Trump's presidency. President Trump has pledged to "build a wall" on the U.S.-Mexico border, has allowed the separation of migrant families who illegally crossed the border and has ordered Immigration and Customs Enforcement raids in major cities.

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