Exodus, or the Voluntary Prisoners of Architecture: Exhausted Fugitives Led to Reception
Rem Koolhaas
Dutch, born 1944
Madelon Vriesendorp
Dutch, born 1945
Elia Zenghelis
British, born Greece 1937
Zoe Zenghelis
British, born Greece 1937
1972
A 1972 collage by Rem Koolhaas that fuses cut-and-pasted photographs, photolithographs, and hand-applied color to stage a dystopian scene of exhausted people funneled through regimented architectural infrastructure.
What hits you first is the procession of black-and-white figures and a ruined trench in the foreground abruptly juxtaposed with a lurid, heat‑map–like colored skyline above, the two joined by a regiment of lampposts and fences that turn the image into a staged corridor of control.
An early example of Koolhaas’s image-driven research, this work turned architectural representation into cinematic, narrative collage to critique planning as a form of social control and to open new methods for thinking about cities and movement.
Medium
Cut-and-pasted gelatin silver photographs and photolithographs with ink, crayon, and felt-tipped pen on paper
Dimensions
16 x 11 1/2" (40.6 x 29.2 cm)
Classification
Department
Credit
Gift of Patricia Phelps de Cisneros, Takeo Ohbayashi Purchase Fund, and Susan de Menil Purchase Fund
Accession
361.1996
Palette
Art Terms
Exhibitions
