CÉSAR LOPEZ IS A 2024-25 UNIVERSITY DESIGN RESEARCH FELLOWSHIP WINNER, PART OF 'EXHIBIT COLUMBUS' TEAM
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Assistant Professor of Architecture César A. Lopez
Exhibit Columbus is a program of Landmark Columbus Foundation and an exploration of community, architecture, art, and design that activates the modern legacy of Columbus, Indiana. It creates a cycle of programming that uses this context to convene conversations around innovative ideas and commissions site-responsive installations in a free, public exhibition.
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This year's theme of Exhibit Columbus, Yes And, invites contributors to explore the legacy of Columbus, Indiana, by adding to the multiple and overlapping lives of buildings and spaces. Originating in improv theater, Yes And is a technique for affirming and building upon an idea to create a shared narrative. The curators have drawn inspiration from this participatory call to work from existing material to shape positive change.
Starting with the October 2024 Symposium, and through a cycle of events including the public exhibition in August 2025, Exhibit Columbus will encourage the public to collaborate in the creation of the ongoing performance of the city. Whether by recovering architectural remnants, reflecting on cultural legacy, staging a dramatic spectacle, or reimagining public play, Yes And invites everybody to the public spaces of Columbus to expand what forms of togetherness and collaboration are possible.
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Exhibit Columbus recently announced four J. Irwin and Xenia S. Miller Prize Recipients along with six teams of University Design Research Fellows (UDRF), including one with the University of Virginia's César A. Lopez.
Lopez's team includes Jess Myers (Syracuse University), Amelyn Ng (Columbia University), and Germán Pallares-Avitia (Rhode Island School of Design) — collectively they will continue the tradition of having talented and internationally-recognized participants involved with Exhibit Columbus. Each will bring their own innovative creative process and experience with community engagement to this cycle. Their proposal titled Public School Grounds aims to extend their admiration for modern architecture to children and the larger Columbus community.
PUBLIC SCHOOL GROUNDS
“Every one of us lives and moves all his life within the limitations, sight, and influence of architecture – at home, at school, at church and at work. The influence of architecture with which we are surrounded in our youth affects our lives, our standards, our tastes when we are grown, just as the influence of the parents and teachers with which we are surrounded in our youth affects us as adults.” —J. Irwin Miller
The team's installation will draw inspiration from the dynamic rooflines and material patterns found in mid-century modern-designed schools in Columbus, Indiana, such as Schmitt Elementary (1957, designed by Harry Weese), Parkside Elementary (1962, designed by Norman Fletcher), and W D Richards Elementary School (1965, designed by Edward Larrabee Barnes), among others. Throughout the University Design Research Fellowship, they will work with the students, educators, and staff at these schools to scale down and collage these rooflines to create an engaging sensorial platform for children.
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The installation will be a tactile experience, potentially constructed from reclaimed local brick or colorful recycled foam, drawing from the vast range of brickwork and bond patterns found across Columbus’ modern architectural landscape. By creating an interesting and interactive space at ground level, the new public space will showcase the influence of educational architecture on the city, highlight the significance of children in the community, and prioritizing hands-on play as a learning tool.
The built installation will be accompanied by a series of workshops and programs facilitated by the Public School Grounds team who will work directly with students, educators, and staff at select local schools through key partnerships with two related organizations, The Bartholomew Consolidated School Corporation (BCSC) and The Bartholomew Consolidated School Foundation (BCSF).
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A critical objective of the installation is to find a reuse for the project following the conclusion of Exhibit Columbus programming, so that the mission of exposing a broader community to the wonder and beauty of the built environment will have a longer legacy. With this in mind, the team aims to design the installation in pieces or sections so that it can easily be assembled, disassembled, transported, and distributed to schools needing recreational equipment and/or to communities as public furniture. Alternatively, if the project is donated to a single school or after-care organization, the team's design will allow it to be “re-collaged” in various configurations, rather than remaining in its original consolidated form, to allow the project to evolve according to the new client's needs and contexts.
Through a collaborative and community-engaged approach, Public School Grounds seeks to bring the tactile and sensory elements that have enriched educational environments within schools to the broader public and inspire inquisitive play within the city of Columbus. The team aims to foster an environment that encourages hands-on learning, imaginative exploration, and meaningful interactions for individuals of all ages.
PROJECT TEAM
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César A. Lopez—Design Lead
Assistant Professor in Architecture, University of Virginia, School of Architecture
César A. Lopez is an Assistant Professor at the University of Virginia School of Architecture and co-director of FRONTERA-NATION. His research explores the hidden physical and metaphorical boundaries within built environments and spaces to inspire new spatial interpretations that shift power and belonging to new individuals. As an educator, César embraces his experiences as a first-generation college graduate to inform plural pedagogical approaches in teaching design studios and visualization courses. César brings extensive installation experience through national and internationally recognized projects at the Yerba Buena Center for the Arts, the 2019 Seoul Biennale of Architecture and Urbanism, the 2021 Venice Architecture Biennale, and the 2021 Chicago Architecture Biennale. In 2023, César was awarded the Rome Prize in Architecture by the American Academy in Rome.
Jess Myers—The Sound Designer
Assistant Professor of Architecture, Syracuse University
Jess Myers is an urbanist and assistant professor of architecture at Syracuse University whose practice includes work as an editor, writer, podcaster, and curator. In the past, Jess has worked in diverse roles—archivist, analyst, teacher—within cultural practices that include Bernard Tschumi Architects, the Service Employees International Union, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, and Rhode Island School for Design. Her research engages sound and multimedia platforms as a means to explore politics and residency in urban conditions. Her podcast Here There Be Dragons takes an in-depth look at the impact of security narratives on urban planning through the eyes of city residents in New York, Paris, and Stockholm. Her work can be found in Urban Omnibus, The Architect’s Newspaper, Log, l’Architecture d’Aujourd’hui, Avery Review, The Architectural Review, Places, Dwell, and the Funambulist Magazine. Her 2022 exhibition, A Pause Is Not A Break, was on “view” in Providence Rhode Island, Ames, Iowa, and Ottawa, Canada. Her most recent piece, Post-Occupants was on “view” at the Houston Center for Architecture.
Amelyn Ng—The Material Explorer
Assistant Professor in Representation, Columbia University, GSAPP
Amelyn Ng is an Assistant Professor of Architecture at Columbia University GSAPP, and a registered architect in the state of Victoria, Australia. Her research and exhibition practice explores architecture as media and environmental matter as information, and seeks alternate narratives to the status quo of building. Her recent work and teaching explore the tactility of second-hand materials, value of biomaterials, and ways in which design can accommodate irregular materials and patterns. Ng brings exhibition and research experience, having participated in the 17th and 18th Venice Architecture Biennales, the 2024 Copenhagen Architecture Festival, and the 8th Bi-City Biennale of Urbanism/Architecture in Shenzhen. Material-forward exhibitions include D.E.P.O.T. / Gross Domestic Practices in Providence and Planetary Home Improvement in Prague. Amelyn has practiced architecture in Melbourne, Australia and has previously taught at the Rhode Island School of Design and Rice University.
German Pallares-Avitia—The Modernist Historian
Assistant Professor in History & Theory, Rhode Island School of Design, Department of Architecture
Germán Pallares-Avita is a Mexican registered architect and scholar. He holds a Ph.D. in Architecture from the University of Pennsylvania. His research lies at the intersection of modernization, cultural relations, borders and politics in the context of Latin America and the US. Pallares’ work is interdisciplinary, drawing on fields such as border, Chicano and gender studies, environmental history and urbanism, and explores post-colonial and decolonial concepts that refine understandings of territories, nations, identity and migration as they relate urban conditions. Pallares-Avitia is currently an assistant professor at Rhode Island School of Design, where he previously held the position of SEI Research Fellow from 2021-2023. Pallares-Avitia was the curator of the history of the architecture for Museo de Arte de Ciudad Juarez 60th anniversary exhibition.
2024-25 J. IRWIN AND XENIA S. MILLER PRIZE RECIPIENTS
— Adaptive Operations
Chicago
— AD—WO
New York City
— Studio Barnes
Miami
— Studio Cooke John
New York City
2024-25 UNIVERSITY DESIGN RESEARCH FELLOWS (UDRF)
— Chandler Ahrens, Constance Vale, and Kelley Van Dyck Murphy
Washington University in St. Louis College of Architecture Sam Fox School
— Sarah Aziz
University of New Mexico School of Architecture and Planning
— Akima Brackeen
University of Illinois Urbana Champaign School of Architecture
— Andrew Fu, Aaron Goldstein, and Aleksandr Mergold
New Jersey Institute of Technology Hillier College of Architecture and Design
— Michael Jefferson and Suzanne Lettieri
Cornell University School of Architecture
— César A. Lopez, Jess Myers, Amelyn Ng, and Germán Pallares-Avitia
University of Virginia School of Architecture, Syracuse University School of Architecture, Columbia University GSAPP, and Rhode Island School of Design
The University Design Research Fellows (UDRF) were selected through a national, open call competition for full-time university professors whose work is deeply rooted in design research, across any area of design, architecture, art, and landscape architecture.
All of the participants will be in Columbus for the upcoming Symposium, which takes place October 24-25 in downtown Columbus. The Symposium will be followed by design presentations by the selected teams to take place on February 21-22. The Exhibition, including designed experiences using Columbus’ heritage as inspiration and context while highlighting a visionary community's role in growing a vibrant, sustainable, and equitable city, will launch in August 2025.
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24-25 Exhibit Columbus Curatorial Partners
Could Be Design, Joseph Altshuler and Zack Morrison (Chicago and Urbana-Champaign, IL); Mila Lipinski (Jackson, MS); Rasul Mowatt (Raleigh, NC); Preservation Futures, Elizabeth Blasius and Jonathan Solomon (Chicago, IL); Too Black (Indianapolis, IN)
The Curatorial Partners form the core of the curatorial team and are charged with creating and advancing the theme of this cycle of Exhibit Columbus. Their background represents a depth of experience in architecture, history, design, writing, and performing arts. Each curator has worked with people and within groups to bring a thoughtful and artistic approach to collaborating within diverse communities.
