LOS ANGELES — Architect and engineer Alejandro Zohn may be the most influential person shaping public space in Guadalajara, Mexico, but beyond its borders few know him. The MAK Center for Art and Architecture introduced him to Los Angeles with Finding Zohnan enigmatic exhibition that reveals the similarities between Zohn and RM Schindler, both Jewish emigrants from Austria, and their cities, Guadalajara and Los Angeles.
The exhibition is not a simple study of Zohn. Instead, curators Mimi Zeiger, a Los Angeles-based critic, and Tony Macarena, the pseudonym of the Mexico City-based design team of Lorena Canales and Alejandro Olávarri, commissioned six artists to respond to their work. Their renditions stretch across the MAK’s Schindler House, wedging into chimneys and standing upright, like billboards placed in gardens.
Zara Pfeifer’s “Untitled (El Archivo)” (2022) and Adam Wiseman’s “Orden / Caos” (2022-2023) draw parallels between Zohn and Schindler, showing why this property was a natural fit for the exhibition. Their photographs of two designs by Zohn, the Hall of Records, Archivo del Estado de Jalisco – “El Archivo” to locals – and a public bandshell, Concha Acústica, focus on the long winding steps and rectangular facades of the structures. They correspond to the stretched, low-ceilinged body of the Schindler House and the wooden beams and panels that segment the house. Most of the pictures are small and delicately hung from support beams and flutter in the breeze.
Their photographs also accentuate the role shadow plays in Zohn’s designs. Wiseman’s close-ups on the dramatic, angled concrete expose deep shadows that spin into spiers, inviting you to step into its recess. One of Pfeifer’s photos shows a group of people huddled under a tree in the courtyard of El Archivo, one of the few sources of shadow on Brutalist construction. It makes connections to the many treeless areas of Los Angeles, especially in low-income, mostly Latinx neighborhoods. Without context, Guadalajaras could easily be confused with Angelenos.
Because Zohn primarily designed public spaces like government buildings, libraries, and housing projects, his structures continue to thrive with life. Onnis Luque captures the day-to-day activities of modern Guadalajaras in “INFO33” (2022), who all live at the Unidad Habitacional CTM-Atemajac, Zohn’s government housing completed in 1978. The youngest residents are now three generations away from workers in the original public transport that received apartments. Luque’s photographs contrast the older generation, politely standing with their hands in their pockets, staring at the floor or sitting at a table with their hands clasped, with the more flamboyant younger generation, posing with their hands up, tattoos flashing, giving the best angle to their crises.
Although most of the snapshots show a fairly mundane existence, Sonia Madrigal’s “Occupy the Landscape” (2022) shines a light on the violence women face in public spaces. In 2019, Atzhiri Paulina Sánchez was murdered, victim of femicide, in a parking lot of Edificio Mulbar, a shopping mall designed by Zohn. Madrigal captures the decaying mall across the street, a challenging view that matches a predator’s perspective. Sánchez had entered the garage to photograph the sunset, and Madrigal associates the structure’s documentation with an ethereal blue-violet impression of twilight, the view ripped from Sánchez and so many other women.
A disadvantage to Finding Zohn is that much of this information is obfuscated. No didactic accompanies the photographs, projections or ephemera presented in showcases. Without them, the work reads like daily snapshots of Guadalajara and might even be mistaken for archival material rather than new works commissioned for the exhibition. For a character relatively unknown in the United States, this detracts from Zohn’s story, as well as those of the subjects featured in the work.
Yet the harmony between the architectural styles of Zohn and Schindler is immediately apparent as you walk through the house. Both contributed greatly to the personality of their city, whether it was Zohn’s Zygarot-inspired amphitheater seating or Schindler’s oblong timber-framed houses. Through public and private space, they allow forms to take a back seat to the experience of life.
Finding Zohn continues at the MAK Center for Art and Architecture (Schindler House, 835 North Kings Road, West Hollywood) through July 23. The exhibition was curated by Mimi Zeiger and Tony Macarena.
