Serpents in the Museum

In addition to the above quote, the projects by Carlos Lazo, Mathias Goeritz, Juan O’Gorman, and Javier Senosiain also explore "the adaptation of natural structures to modern living [and] the practical and environmental benefits of moving underground," according to Dakin Hart, Senior Curator at The Isamu Noguchi Foundation and Garden Museum based in Long Island City, Queens.

Although the majority of the projects in the exhibition bearing the lengthy title In Praise of Caves: Organic Architecture Projects from Mexico by Carlos Lazo, Mathias Goeritz, Juan O’Gorman, and Javier Senosiain were produced decades ago, their relevance to the present is undeniable. A long reliance on fossil fuels is not only changing the climate, it is sealing off many humans from the natural environment and contributing to unhealthy lifestyles. The projects — some of them unbuilt, but quite a few realized remarkably — offer inspiration for people striving to reconnect with nature or live in ways that are healthier and less taxing on renewable resources.

It is hardly a coincidence that the cave-like dwellings full of snake-like imagery were born in the mild climate in and around Mexico City, where life can take place outside year-round. But the artistic–architectural creations are wholly unexpected and refreshing all these decades later. World-Architects attended a press preview before the October 19th opening, and below are some of our impressions on the work of the four artist–architects in the must-see show.

Entrance to the museum's galleries where most of In Praise of Caves is located is through a trapezoidal open-air gallery that Isamu Noguchi (1904–1988) added to his studio to display the large stones he chiseled into sculptures. Snaking through a few of those pieces is artist Mathias Goeritz's La Serpiente de El Eco (El Eco Serpent) from 1953, four years after he emigrated to Mexico from Germany. Goeritz (1915–1990) made the piece for his Museo Experimental El Eco (the one in the Noguchi exhibition is a copy) and described it as "a fever chart" meant to "express the anguish of man in the universe." More smaller Goeritz pieces are included inside and all of them, like El Eco Serpent, coexist with the Noguchi artworks rather than displacing them for the exhibition.

Visitors next come across a room devoted to the home of Mexican architect and painter Juan O'Gorman (1905–1982) that he realized between 1948 and 1954, two decades after he designed buildings in the International Style, such as the home and studio of artists Diego Rivera and Frida Kahlo and the house for Cecil O'Gorman. Located in the Pedregal neighborhood of Mexico City — literally in and on the lava bed of a dormant volcano — the house he made for he and his family is the antithesis of his early architectural work, though it is in line with the striking large-scale murals he created in the 1950s. The latter find expression in the mosaics covering the exterior surfaces of Casa O'Gorman.

Although the house was famous in its time (a spread from a 1959 issue of Life Magazine describing the house as a "Mosaic-Mad Grotto" is on display in the gallery), O'Gorman sold it in the 1960s, after which it was maligned by the subsequent owner. (The exhibition guide describes Casa O'Gorman as "tragically ruined.") O'Gorman wrote that the house was built as "a cry of protest in favor of humanism" and against a civilization "that tries to destroy all expression rooted in the humanistic nature of man." The house is lesser known today but deserves more attention — something this exhibition may contribute toward.

Like the O'Gorman room, another cave-like gallery with a window on just one wall is given over to a couple of projects by Carlos Lazo (1914–1955), a Mexican architect who tragically died in an airplane crash while in his early 40s. At the time of his untimely death he was working on Cuevas Civilizadas (Civilized Caves), a development with 110 homes dug into a canyon wall in Mexico City's Belén de las Flores neighborhood. The project (visible on the far wall of the above photo) was started by never completed, eventually covered over. The other project on display is La Casa-Cueva de la Era Atómica (Atomic Age Cave House) completed in 1948. Drawings and a newly built model convey the indoor/outdoor, aboveground/underground qualities of a house that was ahead of its time.

During the preview of the exhibition, curator Dakin Hart described how the Noguchi Museum does not "chase" artists or themes for its temporary exhibitions. In the case of In Praise of Caves, the impetus was art dealer Ricardo Suárez Haro, who contacted the museum with his proposal via email. Standing out among the four artist–architects he chose is Javier Senosiain Aguilar (b. 1948), who is the only living person among them but whose creations are very much aligned with the projects by Goeritz, O'Gorman, and Lazo. Senosiain was actually a student of Goeritz at the Universidad Nacional Autonoma de Mexico (UNAM), where O'Gorman happened to designed the Central Library. The inclusion of Senosiain among the other three artist–architects can be seen as an expression of how the ideas from a half-century ago are still valid today.

Most of the serpents in the exhibition are found in the large gallery hosting a handful of Senosiain's projects. Most striking is the bench, La Coata, visible at the top of this article, originally built for the Mexican Consulate in Montreal but similarly wrapping its neck around a column inside the Noguchi Museum. (Unlike most art in a museum, visitors are allowed to sit on La Coata.) Projects both built and unbuilt feature serpent heads emerging from the earth and buildings snaking across the landscape. Most incredible of these is El Nido de Quetzalcóatl, a 12-unit apartment building built fifteen years ago that looks like a playground from someone's dreams rather than a conventional building. The same can be said about Casa Orgánica, a house from 1985 that prefigures later designs by Zaha Hadid Architects. Senosiain is not a familiar name like Hadid, but these projects reveal he should be better known beyond Mexico City.