(click on image to enlarge)

Throughout the underpinning of modernist design, aspirations of efficiency and comfort have galvanized visions of what might be possible in the future. Jeremiah Hulsebos-Spofford revisits these foundations, seeking fractures, little failures on the surface that reveal the invisible workflow and the breakdown of functionalism. Inspired by the history of the 1927 architectural competition in Geneva, which asked architects to submit plans for the creation of the Palace of Nations, Hulsebos-Spofford points to the unsettled quandaries and contradictions between classical design, and modernist functionalism. Repeating classical sculptural figures remind us of copy-and-paste multiple errors that reference the history of the gipsoteca galleries. We are reminded of the function of our phones, and its attachments to work and labor dependency, as its surface naturally distresses our jeans and its haptic vibrations alarming the torso. Behind all of these references, we are presented with a global constellation of history and technological decay.

The exhibition is curated by Greg Lunceford with an introduction written by Gibran Villalobos.

League of Nations is made possible with support from the Department of Cultural Affairs, City of Chicago, Indiana University Northwest, the Illinois Arts Council and the United Nations Library and Archive.