'Sergei Tchoban: Sections of the Mind' at the Paul Rudolph Institute for Modern Architecture
Sections Through Sergei Tchoban's Mind
Open since April 3, Sergei Tchoban: Sections of the Mind is on display at the Paul Rudolph Institute for Modern Architecture in New York City until June 7, 2025. The exhibition features a selection of Sergei Tchoban's fantastical drawings plus a half-hour interview between the Berlin architect and Vladimir Belogolovsky, the show's curator.
The phrase “Sections of the Mind” has multiple meanings in the context of this exhibition spread across two floors of the Modulightor Building designed by Paul Rudolph. The various freehand charcoal and ink drawings, watercolors, pastels, and prints provide insight into Tchoban's working process; they provide a peek into his mind, if you will. Some of the drawings even depict architectural sections through fantastical structures in the shapes of heads, providing commentary on certain issues like the unnecessary demolition of buildings. More subtly, with all of the thirty on display drawn in section, the exhibition pays homage to the importance of Rudolph's perspectival sections, many of which were on display at The Met last year.
Before taking in the drawings hung on two floors of the Modulightor Building, visitors to Sergei Tchoban: Sections of the Mind step off the elevator and encounter a video interview between Tchoban and curator Vladimir Belogolovsky. While the interview running on a loop sheds more insight on Tchoban's process, many visitors may prefer to spend more time looking closely at the drawings on the wall, occasionally taking in snippets of the interview. Thankfully, Belogolovsky uploaded the interview to his Curatorial Project channel on YouTube for watching anytime and anywhere, so we're embedding it here:
As a bonus, here is another interview between Tchoban and Belogolovsky, this one focused on Tchoban's in-progress project for Festival Hall for the Waldorf School in Magdeburg, Germany. The interview was done in the context of No Doubt About It, an exhibition curated by Belogolovsky that opens at the Magazzino Gallery at Palazzo Contarini Polignac in Venice on May 8, 2025.
