Letica Pardo: Carcasa (109 E. Ontario St.)

Through a material reconfiguration of the Mies van der Rohe stair and walls from The Arts Club building, the installation foregrounds aspects of architectural production often minimized or rendered invisible within dominant historical narratives. Originally produced for The Arts Club’s former location, the stair was salvaged from demolition and reinstalled in the institution’s current building, becoming an object in the collection.

Translating the stair into exposed rebar—a material typically embedded within built infrastructure and intentionally concealed—brings construction to the surface. The seemingly unfinished structure draws attention to manual labor carried out by immigrant workers who have sustained the U.S. building industry. Silicone casts taken from travertine slabs surrounding the staircase function as reversed impressions of the stone, revealing internal veining and voids as surface textures. Together, the rebar structure and silicone casts establish a dialogue between structure and body, visibility and concealment, and value and labor.

Reducing architecture to bone and skin, Carcasa (109 E. Ontario St.) approaches modernism as a system whose authority and visibility were produced through selective recognition. In doing so, it positions architecture as a cultural record of collective making shaped by social relations.

This project was curated by Executive Director and Chief Curator Janine Mileaf.

This site-specific installation involved production assistance by Dishan Rahman, and metal fabrication by Alejandro Castellanos, Ernesto Garcia, Jair Martínez, José Martinez, Ricardo Martínez, Danilo Medina, Ernesto Medina, Gonzalo Medina, Nelson Ramírez, Francisco Rivadeneyra, Heriberto Valdez, Daniel Valencia, Randi Vigueras, D5 Design and Metal Fabrication.

Special thanks goes to Gallery Manager Colby Starck and preparators Reggie Williamson, Xavier Hughes, and Adele Henning.

Carcasa (109 E. Ontario St.) (detail), Leticia Pardo. Photo by Fran Peñaflor.