ON DIT QUE LE MAGUEY EST LA TERRE ELLE-MÊME

vol. 44

Pablo López Luz photographs
Ivan Alechine text
Bijoy Jain / Studio Mumbai case

Pablo López Luz (Mexico, b. 1979)

Pablo López Luz grew up in an artistic family, becoming acquainted with celebrated Mexican photographers such as Graciela Iturbide, whose influence on the young Pablo was considerable. In 2006, after studying communications, he earned a master’s degree in art at New York University and the International Center of Photography in New York. Pablo’s work owes a great deal to the Mexican landscape tradition. He is best known for his aerial photographs of Mexico City, a megalopolis in a process of constant mutation, of rapid and chaotic growth. He has also explored the links between history and the contemporary world, especially the question of the Mexican national identity.

His work has garnered international recognition and been the object of solo exhibitions at the Museo Experimental El Eco, the Museo del Chopo, and Arróniz Arte Contemporáneo, all in Mexico City, as well as at Le Botanique in Brussels and the Centro Fotográfico Manuel Álvarez Bravo in Oaxaca. Pablo López Luz has also participated in numerous collective exhibitions: at the Photographers’ Gallery (London), the Fondation Cartier pour l’art contemporain (Paris), the Museum of Fine Arts (Boston), the National Gallery of Canada (Ottawa), the International Center of Photography (New York), the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art, and the Palacio de Bellas Artes (Mexico). He is the author of seven monographic publications: Pablo López Luz (RM, 2012), Pyramid (RM, 2014), Frontera (Newwer/Toluca, 2016), Frontera (Photogramas, 2017), Bajo la Sombra de la Pirámide (Toluca, 2018), Piedra Volcánica (Toluca/RM, 2019), and Baja Moda (RM, 2022). His work has been acquired by various public and private institutions, including the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art, the Museum of Fine Arts in Boston, the Denver Art Museum, the National Gallery of Canada, the Los Angeles County Museum of Art (LACMA), the Fondation A Stichting, and the Poniatowski collection.

Ivan Alechine (Belgium, b. 1952)

Ivan Alechine is a poet. He has published several volumes under the imprints of La Différence, Fata Morgana, and, most recently, Éditions Galilée: Oldies (2012), Trébuchet (2015), and Enterrement au Mexique (2016). Photography soon began to accompany his writings, almost in the form of a working notebook. By the 1990s it had become an integral part of his oeuvre, at the same time as his awareness of the global ecological emergency. His first album, Poca Luz, appeared in 2010 under the joint imprint of RM/Toluca. Belleville sur un nuage is his second book published by Yellow Now, following Énigmes et Portraits dans la Sierra Madre (2018).

Bijoy Jain / Studio Mumbai (India, b. 1965)

Trained as an architect at Washington University in Saint Louis, Bijoy Jain worked with Richard Meier in Los Angeles and in London before returning to India in 1995 and founding the Studio Mumbai, where he skillfully combines Indian craft traditions with contemporary techniques. His work is characterized by a fondness for local materials and attention to climatic conditions. In this way, he creates spaces that enter into dialogue with their surroundings and reflect the importance of the genius loci, the “spirit of the place.” Whether it be a matter of furnishings or architecture per se, the accent is on economy of means, within a context of limited resources. His architecture emphasizes human values by its collaborative approach, closely involving artisans and other workers and underlining the importance of local know-how and the community in the process of architectural creation.

Bijoy Jain’s work has been widely exhibited and has received many honors. He participated in the Venice Biennale in 2010 and 2013 and was awarded the Alvar Aalto Medal in 2020. Bijoy Jain teaches at the architecture academy of the Università della Svizzera italiana in Mendrisio, Switzerland. He has also been a visiting professor at Yale University and the Royal Danish Academy in Copenhagen. In 2024, the Fondation Cartier pour l’art contemporain in Paris presented Le souffle de l’architecte, an exhibition specially created for the institution by Bijoy Jain.

Description:

Each copy contains 14 original photographs (gelatin silver prints) signed by Pablo López Luz, accompanied by a text by Ivan Alechine
Urushi lacquered case
50,5 x 43 x 11,5 cm
Text in French and Spanish
Limited edition of 12 copies + 4 A.P.
September 2025

Graphic design: Olivier Andreotti