One of Houston’s most unique places—and perhaps its most unexpected venue—is celebrating its 100th anniversary of being built and its 10th anniversary as a setting for ambitious artworks.
Often referred to as one of Houston’s spookiest landmarks, the Buffalo Bayou Park Cistern is truly unlike any other structure in the city. Originally built in 1926 to store clean drinking water, it’s a structure that looks like something from ancient Rome, yet feels futuristic in a way. It was restored and repurposed by the Buffalo Bayou Parks into an incredibly special and accessible public space.
The space is a big, dark underground reservoir with rows of stone columns protruding from the knee-deep water that looks much deeper to the ceiling. At first glance, it doesn’t seem like the ideal setting for an art piece, but venturing inside, the echoes bouncing off the water and the architecture beg to be used in ways that highlight it. Tours, performances, and art installations have been part of the underground reservoir’s regular programming for a decade.
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Houston has a reputation for not preserving its history, mainly in the form of the cool and historic buildings and structures—just look at the Astrodome. The cistern could have easily been another victim of that mentality. It’s easy to envision a world where the powers that be decided that a parking lot would be a better use for the space off Allen Parkway.
Inside a cavern is an interactive audio-visual light show
Lights in “Undercurrents” are placed throughout the structure’s 221 columns.
Buffalo bayou Parks
The nature of what the cistern is—a body of natural water housed in a cavernous underground reservoir with more than 200 pillars—means that the art on display has to be created for the venue itself. Each exhibition has a direct, interactive relationship with the cistern and its features. To celebrate its centennial, its latest exhibit is the ideal representation of that relationship and the site’s most interactive installation to date.
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The venue’s latest art installation is the interactive art piece “Undercurrents” from world-renowned Mexican-Canadian multi-media artist Rafael Lozano-Hemmer. Opening on Saturday, “Undercurrents” invites visitors to an audiovisual forum within the reservoir, filling the 87,500-square-foot space with a mile-long LED lightshow suspended over the water. The art piece creates a visual switchboard triggered by messages recorded through a system of linked intercoms.
Essentially, you enter a space that is already a remarkable site. There are special intercoms around the entire structure, which you can press a button to record and send a message. Once your message is recorded, light travels from the intercom throughout the cistern along wires in search of similar messages, then grabs them and brings them back to your intercom. For example, you could simply say “love,” and it will find a similar message recorded there in the past. It’s like something out of a sci-fi film—kind of creepy but also beautiful.
Seeing the lights zip around and the serene echo within the reservoir really put into perspective how large the cistern is. Occasionally, messages will trigger special poems that take over the installation, accompanied by light shows. As the exhibit opens to the public, the system will house more and more messages managed by its AI system, making the experience even more unique to each visit.
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A view of “Undercurrents” at the Buffalo Bayou Parks Cistern.
Nicki Evans/Buffalo Bayou Parks
“Undercurrents” utilizes 1 mile of LED lights.
Nicki Evans/Buffalo Bayou Parks
The cistern is a public space that major cities would jump at the chance to have, but it’s reflective of Houston, which is, in itself, unique. Although many outside of Texas may lump the city in with the standard stereotype, Houston continues to surprise visitors. In the case of the architect of its latest art installation, Rafael Lozano-Hemmer, it completely subverted his expectations.
“I came to Houston thinking it is the epicenter of petroculture, and I have heard things about Texas being very conservative and other things that I don’t relate to,” Lozano-Hemmer, who is from Mexico, lives in Montreal and uses his works to advocate for addressing the climate change crisis, told Chron. “And I find it is the exact opposite. I have met so many progressive people who are doing incredible things, incredible families, who are fighting a good fight—climate change activists, and critics.”
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Being from Mexico and living in Montreal, it’s not a surprise that one would have preconceived notions about a big Texas city. But Houston’s vibe is unique among the major metropolitan areas in the Lone Star State, so, unsurprisingly, it can turn skeptics into fans.
“I came with preconceptions that were wrong, and I love it,” Lozano-Hemmer said. “I love to think about, in a very hopeful way, the vibe that Houston has, which is open, friendly, artistic, experimental and collegiate.”
“Undercurrents” is open starting April 24 until Jan. 24, 2027. Groups of up to 45 guests are admitted every 15 minutes, Wednesday through Sunday, from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. $15, reservations recommended.
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