MAS Context

Join us at MAS Context! Along with Steven Karvelius, AIA, Eric Rothfeder and Bryan Schabel (Perkins&Will)

New in Observations: "Last Stop: An Exploration of the Neighborhoods at the Ends of the Subway Lines in New York City." Iker Gil interviews Brian Rose. Over the course of a year, photographer Brian Rose set out to explore all the neighborhoods at the ends of the subway lines in New York City. The result is?"Last Stop"?(Circa Press, 2025), his new book that focuses on these distinct and often overlooked communities that are integral to the multifaceted fabric of the city. Ahead of the publication of?"Last Stop," Iker Gil interviews Brian Rose to discuss what compelled him to make this project and what he discovered along the way. https://lnkd.in/gwK3DY7u

For my monthly column in MAS Context I traveled to Rogers City, Michigan to visit the Rogers Theater, a beloved single screen Art Moderne movie theater that was gifted to the Presque Isle District Library in 2016 after decades of local stewardship. This unique public resource shows movies, hosts live performances, and serves as a beacon for this small northeastern Michigan community. Thanks, as always for reading! https://lnkd.in/gwdn7gwH

New in Observations: “The Show Goes on at the Rogers Theater.” Monthly column by Elizabeth Blasius. In 2016, a beloved and historic single-screen movie theater, the Rogers Theater, was gifted to the Presque Isle District Library after decades of local stewardship. In her monthly column, Elizabeth Blasius travels to Rogers City, Michigan, to “check out” how this unique community resource is being preserved under the library’s care. https://lnkd.in/gmwDrNWs

Join us on Thursday, March 20, at 5:30 pm for a lecture by Kate Yeh Chiu and Jia Yi Gu, curators and editors of?"Material Acts: Experimentation in Architecture and Design." The program, organized by MAS Context and the University of Illinois at Chicago School of Architecture, will take place at the School of Architecture at UIC (845 West Harrison Street, 1100 A+DS, Chicago, Illinois 60607). "Material Acts: Experimentation in Architecture and Design"?accompanies and shares a name with the exhibition at Craft Contemporary in Los Angeles in 2024, offering a companion space that delves into the research shown in the galleries. The publication is organized around the same five thematic material acts of the exhibition: Animating, Disassembling, Feeding, Re-fusing, and Stitching. Content formats include commissioned essays, photography, how-to-guides, and conversations featuring the exhibition’s scope. The publication includes contributions and projects by Adobeisnotsoftware, After Architecture, Amy Zhang, Anupama Kundoo, Assemble, Assia Crawford, Atelier LUMA, BC architects, Caroline A. Jones, Charlotte Malterre-Barthes, Didem Ekici, DOSU Studio Architecture, Dylan Wood, Elsa MH M?ki, Gramazio Kohler Research, HANNAH, Hilary Huckins-Weidner, Jennifer Johung, Joar Nango, Katariina Tr?skelin, Lola Ben-Alon, Mae-Ling Lokko, Maru Garcia, Omar Kahn, Post Rock, Rael San Fratello, Sara Inga Utsi Bongo, SOFTLAB, Soft Matters, Strat Coffman, Sutherlin Santo, Tag Christof, Ye Rin Mok, Yogiaman Tracy Design, Zara Pfeifer, and Zofia Trafas White. https://lnkd.in/gDtATupS

New in Observations: “Chasing the Sun: The Coastal High-Rises of Benidorm.” Photo essay by Iker Gil. Benidorm is like no other place. Plenty of sunlight, warm temperatures, sandy beaches, and diverse entertainment options have made this seaside city on Spain’s Mediterranean coast a magnet for families, elders, and anyone looking for a good time. To accommodate the throngs of annual visitors from across Spain and abroad, hundreds of coastal high-rises have sprung up in Benidorm since the 1960s. In this photo essay, architect and MAS Context founder and editor in chief Iker Gil captures a selection of fa?ades in the “New York of the Mediterranean.” https://lnkd.in/gJSr655q

Join us on Friday, March 7, and Saturday, March 8, for this unique two-day exhibition showcasing, in one space, models by Kwong Von Glinow Design Office produced during the last eight years. The exhibition will take place at?2021 South Wabash Avenue, Chicago, IL 60616. The ?” =1’-0” scale model has been an integral part of Kwong Von Glinow’s design process since they started their practice eight years ago. The scale of the model allows them to look “into” the model rather than “over” it. Looking in is like finding and the act of finding is important for design. Their primary goal of model-making is not to generate form, but to generate space. The ?” =1’-0” scale model allows them to test multiple spatial qualities: layout and section, material palette, assembly, details, and light. Testing the relationship of how these elements come together in the model allows them to make decisions. Sometimes things go well together, sometimes they see different elements require more tension. The models in?“Models Off-Site”?are a mix of in-progress models from their office, models returned from exhibitions, and models from completed projects that have been in storage. Kwong Von Glinow see this two-day exhibition as an opportunity to bring models from the last eight years of their practice together, unboxed, and in one space. https://lnkd.in/g5JWEN-i

New in Observations: “From Utility to Art: The History of 1544 North Sedgwick Street.” Text by Alison Cuddy (She/Her). 1544 North Sedgwick Street in Chicago’s Old Town neighborhood is a respectably handsome building. The red brick fa?ade features two neat rows of tall slim windows along the second story and ground floor, capped by an unadorned cornice and lintel. Its south wall fits snug against the platform of the Sedgwick Brown Line stop. To the north it edges up and into a small alley. Despite this proximity, the building feels isolated, mysteriously aloof from its neighbors. Nothing about its plain and proper front offers a hint to the role the property has played in some of Chicago’s most significant historical moments, from its emergence as a twentieth-century metropolis powered by electricity, to its rich legacy of architectural innovation and later revival as a creative center for artists. For 125 years and counting, this building has supported some of our city’s transformative possibilities. https://lnkd.in/gwV5SKVj

Join us this Thursday, February 27 at 6 pm for a lecture by Barcelona-based architects Anna & Eugeni Bach. The lecture will take place at the Charnley-Persky?House, home of the Society of Architectural Historians. The work of Anna & Eugeni Bach understands time as an essential ally of architecture. Vernacular architecture's remarkable resourcefulness—whether material, energy, or effort—stems from a prolonged learning process shaped by natural selection and collective knowledge. Individual architects cannot benefit from the trial and error of centuries and, therefore, are obliged to compress time into a design process followed by construction. In their work, the Bachs cast an uninhibited look to the past in order to imagine and construct future scenarios. Anna & Eugeni Bach is a Finnish-Spanish architecture studio based in Barcelona. Blurring the boundaries of architecture, their interests spread across four activities: Professional, through public and private projects ranging from art installations, interior design, housing, public buildings, and public space design that work with the unexpected to provide socially relevant responses; Academic, as associate professors at ETSAB UPC and ETSALS URL and currently Visiting Professors of Architecture at Washington University in St Louis, USA; Research, via projects and installations that deal with the perception of space; and Culture, as directors of the XV Spanish Architecture and Urbanism Biennial and curators of the exhibition “Human Traces—World Heritage” at the Alvar Aalto Museum. Their work has been exhibited in three editions of the Venice Architecture Biennale, the Lisbon Architecture Triennale, la Cité de l’Architecture et du Patrimoine de Paris, the ICO Museum in Madrid, and the Barcelona Museum of Contemporary Art. They have participated in different workshops, lectures, juries and other academic venues in the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Accademia di Architettura di Mendrisio, l’école Plythechnique Fédérale de Lausanne, ETH Zurich, Universidad Autónoma de Lisboa, école d’Architecture de la ville & des territoires Paris-Est, and University of Antwerp. Anna and Eugeni Bach will be introduced by Dan Wheeler, founding principal of Wheeler Kearns Architects. https://lnkd.in/gmYbZzUC

New in Observations: "Chicagoland on Wheels: Roller Skating from the 1880s to the Present." Monthly column by Elizabeth Blasius. For her monthly column, avid roller skater Elizabeth Blasius explores the history of roller skating in Chicago and its suburbs through a trip to the Fleetwood Roller Skating Rink in Summit, Illinois. https://lnkd.in/gbJgAQV8