The fourth Sandra Vivanco Memorial Lecture will be delivered by Ana Paula Ruiz Galindo, co-founder of Pedro y Juana, a multidisciplinary practice in Mexico City. The lecture, tilted “Relatable Objects & Assemblies,” will provide a look into Pedro y Juana’s approach towards architectural objects and the possible relationships they produce. Ana Paula will take the audience on a journey through the work of Pedro y Juana, describing how the office explores the potential of a project and then plays it out–through materiality, texture, taste, history and color–within its sociocultural context.

Ana Paula Ruiz Galindo is the co-founder of Pedro y Juana, a studio based in Mexico City. Pedro y Juana works on a variety of projects across creative professions, exploring the capacity of objects to change their environment through typological transgressions, the indiscriminate use of material, texture, color, placement and/or form. Their projects assemble new and unexpected relationships with those that encounter them. Some of them are: “Hellmut” (2013) a Table turned Bench turned Table for Gallery 1 of Museo Jumex; “Turin 42” (2022) a small apartment complex within and on top of a 1918 House; “With Love from The Tropics” (2017), a hanging garden at the MCA in Chicago; and “Hórama Rama” (2019), a cyclorama for Queens on top of the courtyard of the MoMA PS1. A gallery space for Pamela Weissenberg (2022) is the first of many wooden structures that Pedro y Juana is developing as proof of the versatility of wood and its potential to replace more energy consuming construction materials in Mexico, a cement heavy country. Ana Paula has taught at Cooper Union, Cornell University and Columbia University's Graduate School of Architecture, Preservation, and Planning among others schools. Ana Paula merges her practice and research through teaching, always keeping in mind that  architectural objects should pose questions and engender reflection by those who encounter them on the sociopolitical issues of our time.

Co-presented with the Critical Ethnic Studies Program at CCA.