A Breathing Body

Abstract

In this contribution, I will describe the Mercado Libertad, designed by Alejandro Zohn and built in the 1950’s, by highlighting the activities that takes place inside through the course of a day and through the eyes of several characters. My aim is to not only describe the ingenuity of the design, its remarkable roof, its position in the city and its simultaneous presence of various scales, but also to evoke the imagination of embodied experiences that the building affords. In the following passages, I will attempt to give voice to different characters populating the market. Seeing though the eyes of these characters, and experiencing through their bodies, I hope to illustrate how the architecture of these different scales and materialities, of openness and enclosure, of smoothness and roughness, dignifies their everyday activities in the heart of the city, making it come alive.