The exhibition Cruz y Ortiz 1/200...1/2000 held at Museo ICO from 4 October 2016 through to 22 January 2017 provides an overview of over forty years of the professional careers of architects Antonio Cruz and Antonio Ortiz.
The exhibition boasts great unity. The manner of display on identical tables, all lit in the same way, set in transformed exhibition rooms at the Museo ICO are all geared to achieve this unifying purpose. “We do not doubt the fascination that life–size reproductions holds for those who look at them”, says Antonio Ortiz. “We have attempted to achieve this somewhat via the many models displayed and highlighted in the very title of the exhibition. We have tried to provide a solution to something which all architects agree with: an exhibition of architecture is not easy to do”. On the other hand he adds: “Architects are well acquainted with the transition that takes place when gradually larger scales are used. One starts from an often intuitive beginning until the precision and accuracy required by a technical document is achieved”.
The museum has been divided into three exhibition spaces and two projection areas. Each space has long tables on which the information on each project is displayed. The tables, as well as organising the visit, divide the exhibition Cruz y Ortiz 1/200...1/2000: into six thematic areas: essential projects, the new Atlético de Madrid stadium, significant projects, curved geometry projects, projects with a predominance of interior spaces and projects with split geometries. Four photographs by José Manuel Ballester, National Photography Prize 2010, displayed in strategic locations, add grandeur and beauty to the exhibition. “The collaboration of José Manuel Ballester, through five of his photographs, must be understood as a gesture of generosity and friendship on his part, by accepting a secondary role which is not usual for him. These large format photos highlight, without illustrating, certain points of the exhibition”, adds Antonio Ortiz.
This is an exhibition understood by Cruz y Ortiz Arquitectos as an ongoing project: “six years ago we held our first exhibitions – which we called “Synthesis Architecture” – where we also used models to illustrate what we have just explained. This exhibition would be, therefore, an intensified version of the previous ones. And its title – more aseptic and less pretentious, 1/200...1/2000 – is the acknowledgement of the undeniable capacity of suggestion of the smaller scale.
