Modern Architecture in Mexico City: History, Representation, and the Shaping of a Capital by Kathryn O’Rourke (review)

BOOK REVIEWS 71 ARRIS 27 · 2016 or advanced students than as a text for undergraduates. The essays can be read independently, but separated from the rest of the collection, their references to Smith are unanchored. Methodological questions are central to this book, and its full value will be most appreciated by readers sensitive to subtle differencesofapproachwithinandacrossthedisciplinesstudying the history of the built environment. Richard Cleary The University of Texas at Austin Kathryn O’Rourke. Modern Architecture in Mexico City: History, Representation, and the Shaping of a Capital. Pittsburgh: University of Pittsburgh Press, 2016. ISBN: 9780822944621 Hardcover: 432 pages Most narratives on modern Mexican and Latin American architecture tend to be repeated frequently, but are often injected with new, relevant material by foreigners’ accounts, largely ones from American authors. Kathryn O’Rourke follows this tradition by exploring chilango1 architecture while trying to reconcile a tired “official” historiography and an approach to Mexican architecture’s most powerful trait: the façade. In Modern Architecture in Mexico City, O’Rourke builds an answer to the historiographical problem of the architecture of Mexico and the intricate term of a specific Mexican architecture with a complex and rigorous study of works built in MexicoCity. Thebookisdividedintosixchapters,eachexamining a range of topics through an exploration of major works—mostly public commissions and a few private buildings—by wellknown architects. The author’s process is similar to those seen in recent studies on Mexican modernity (not exclusively on architecture) published in the past few decades dealing with identity, nationalism, race, media, and publicity—most notably those of Valerie Fraser, Rubén Gallo, Mauricio Tenorio-Trillo, and Luis E. Carranza. O’Rourke appeals to the reader to look more closely to find new things and, in doing so, makes new discoveries in some of the highest profile modern projects. It is particularly interesting how, according to O’Rourke, Mexican architects have knit their understanding of architecture with a continuous search for a distinctly Mexican architecture. As detailedinChapterOne,architectsadaptedmodernitytosuittheir clients’andtheirownneedsthroughthestudyofphotographsand paintings of colonial and nineteenth-century Mexico. They also widely employed media from contemporaneous artists and intellectuals . SomeofO’Rourke’sdiscoveriesareespeciallyenthralling: InChapterTwo,sheaddresseswithproperdepthCarlosObregón Santacilia’s Mexican Pavilion in Rio de Janeiro and the Ministry of Health headquarters, the latter of which is often identified as plain Mexican art déco2 and here is cast as a true transitional project. Later,inChapterThree,sheunearthsanddissectscolonial references to Juan Segura’s mostly forgotten Deportivo Carranza, ahigh-profilegovernmentprojectaimedatrevolutionizingleisure through artistic health education and architecture. In the second half of the book, beginning with Chapter Four, O’Rourke provides an excellent account of Juan O’Gorman’s 1932primaryschoolsasjuxtapositionsofradicalandunorthodox functionalism mixed with popular Mexican architecture, pulquería3 paintings,andsuper-graphicsorrótulos. Thischapter highlights an important facet of O’Gorman, working for the Ministry of Education, as both a crafted architect and a prolific image-maker, and includes the tiny but eye-opening revelation that O’Gorman’s house for Frida Kahlo was originally painted pink, not blue.4 In Chapter Five, O’Rourke further delves into a recurrent study of the long Mexican fascination with ruins. She investigates this from the perspective of Alberto Arai’s use BOOK REVIEWS 72 of the Mayan site Bonampak to inform his 1952 frontones at Ciudad Universitaria. Finally, in Chapter Six, O’Rourke presents an intriguing and well-crafted exploration of Luis Barragán’s career, as seen through his house in Tacubaya. In Mexico City, Barragán became a true speculator, but in turn lived as an outcast not only from his professional colleagues but also from the old-fashioned Mexican traditions still prevalent today.5 Yet, in architecture not everything is a façade. While much of O’Rourke’s interest focuses on challenging traditional historiography , all that effort relies on the exterior of the buildings, leaving limited room for analysis on spatial organizations. Compare, for example, the comprehensive spatial analysis of the Ministry of HealthbuildingappearinginmostMexicanarchitecturalaccounts, to O’Rourke’s limited discussion of the plans of O’Gorman elementaryschools. The book,on occasion,alsofocusesontopics thathavebeendealtwithnumeroustimesbefore. Perhapsthiswas donetohelpfamiliarizenewreaderswiththeMexicancontextbut the analysis of the Ciudad Universitaria campus, as interesting as it is, feels as if it is there by default and, moreover, has subtle but importantomissions. Apartfromafewgeographicalinconsistencies, the author includes two fascinating...