Tezos

The mesmerising architecture of a Mexican master

Creator

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Description

"Cantilevered from a chunky steel column, strapped to a base of pink concrete blocks, it is a startling arrival on the grounds of this hallowed modernist sanctuary. It’s particularly strange as the hoarding in question is not advertising injury law or a Hollywood movie about a coked-up bear, but a 1970s public housing project in the Mexican city of Guadalajara. The choice of Zohn is an inspired one. Like Schindler, he was a Jewish émigré to the Americas – his parents fled Vienna in 1939 when he was eight – and a prolific architect, with around 500 projects to his name, yet he remains virtually unknown outside Mexico. Unlike Luis Barragán or Félix Candela, icons of mid-century modernism whose photogenic work travelled widely, Zohn was a generation later (he died in 2000). Rather than stage a straight monographic show, Zeiger and co-curator Tony Macarena (the nom de plume of Mexico City-based “design queeratorial duo”, Lorena Canales and Alejandro Olávarri) invited five artists to explore a selection of Zohn’s buildings through photography and video. The intention was to move away from the documentary mode of architectural photography towards a more subjective position, using the artists’ “acts of investigation and translation” to “find glimpses of [Zohn’s] utopian desire amid the chaos, beauty and violence of everyday life”, as the curators put it. The result is a range of tantalising vignettes that leave you wanting to find out more." 04/10/23 Check the full article copying the link: https://www.theguardian.com/artanddesign/2023/apr/10/alejandro-zohn-guadalajara-mexican

Traits

Tag

aiart

Tag

generativeart