Insiders’ Creative Couples: Art, Architecture, And The Alchemy Of Partnership

By Judith Jenya

In San Miguel de Allende, where artistic energy runs as thick as the afternoon sun, two remarkable artists — Zoë Siegel and Oscar Martínez Heredia — have not only created bodies of work that stretch across mediums but built a life that blurs the line between home and gallery, art and daily living. I visited their home — a soaring, light-filled space of arches, white-on-white geometry, and the deep elegance of intentional design. Shadows played across the floor like brushstrokes. Their two dogs bounded around. It’s the kind of house you don’t want to leave.

Oscar was born in México City, raised in a home where art and performance were not just encouraged. His father, originally an actor in movies, became a classifier of movies while Oscar had unlimited access to the films.  His mother was a painter and art teacher. With that foundation, Oscar studied graphic design at the University of Xalapa and fell in love with the music there. He explored his creative instincts through mixed media — watercolor, pastel, oil, photo-realism, to abstraction.In 1998, en route to Baja California for a job, Oscar stopped in San Miguel to visit a cousin. He never left. He painted, won a major local award that provided him with a studio and housing, and began building his life here. It was during that time Zoë saw him painting in the Jardín.

Zoë Siegel was born in New York City and raised in Woodstock. Her artistic lineage runs deep—her mother, a ceramicist who made their dining room table in ceramic tiles and an author, her father, a painter and sculptor who gifted her chairs he made that adorn their living room. She earned her MFA at the School of Visual Arts in New York after graduating from Oberlin College. After 9/11, she arrived in San Miguel to live in the house her parents built.. It became her haven, and ultimately, her home.

When they met 22 years ago, Zoë was preparing a show at Bellas Artes. Oscar missed the opening but asked to see the show on their first date. She took this as a test — was he serious about art? Turns out, he was. Together they’ve raised two artistically inclined children, now 16 and 18.

Oscar plays jarana, a traditional instrument from Veracruz, and performs with the group Colonche 432 every Tuesday morning at Café 1910. Music is part of the family rhythm. Zoë is a force of artistic nature. She calls her sculptural work "cuts," combining photography, wearable art, and surrealist self-deconstruction. During the pandemic, she began creating headpieces from light materials — tape, tracing paper, wire — transforming isolation into playful reinvention. Her work is strange, funny, evocative, and unflinching. It asks the viewer to reimagine the human form, gender, and embodiment. There’s often a digital or kinetic component, pushing the boundary between image and movement. One of her inspirations is Calder.

She also builds houses. Nineteen of them. Without formal training, Zoë hand-draws the plans, hires an architect to formalize them, and runs her own crew. Her homes are filled with arches, columns, light, color, and ironwork—touchstones of both Italian and Mexican design. Her aesthetic is clean and grand, with natural light as her palette. Her first project? Renovating a Chelsea apartment with her brother using a borrowed book on plumbing.

This is a couple whose lives and work feed one another. Oscar cooks. Zoë co-parents. He provides honest critique. She believes in his vision. They’ve built a shared creative life with mutual support as its cornerstone. Their story is the story of San Miguel — an invitation to live artfully, to blur the boundaries between form and function, to create not just objects, but spaces and lives that breathe. It’s rare to find a couple where both are so deeply committed to their creative expression and each other’s flourishing. If you have the chance to visit Zoë’s upcoming workshop or view their work, take it.

Whimsical Mobile Workshop:

Coming in early summer

Contact: zoe@zoesiegel.com

Zoë: zoesiegel.com

Oscar: oscar.com.mx

If you want to suggest a couple that both are involved in their own creative process please email judith58sma@gmail.com