SPACES  |  August 28, 2025

SPACES announces the return of the 2023 Venice Biennale of Architecture Exhibition Everlasting Plastics to Cleveland

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

August 28, 2025 Pita Brooks, Director of Operations 216.621.2314 ext. 202

pita@spacescle.org

Image credit: Lauren Yeager, “Longevity” Everlasting Plastics (Venice, IT 2023). ReportArch/Andrea Ferro Photography.

WHAT: SPACES announces the return of the 2023 Venice Biennale of Architecture Exhibition Everlasting Plastics to Cleveland

WHERE: SPACES 2900 Detroit Avenue, Cleveland, OH 44113

WHEN: Public opening reception, Friday, September 26, 2025, 6:00 PM - 9:00 PM Exhibition on view Sept 26, 2025 - Jan 17, 2026

SPACES is pleased to welcome Everlasting Plastics back to its Cleveland home. Originally premiering in the U.S. Pavilion at the 2023 Venice Biennale of Architecture, and then traveling on to the Carnegie Museum of Art in Pittsburgh in 2024, this compelling group exhibition brings together a diverse group of artists and designers to examine our complex relationship with plastic. Everlasting Plastics includes site-specific works by Xavi L. Aguirre (Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Assistant Professor of Architecture); Simon Anton (Detroit-based designer); Ang Li (Northeastern University School of Architecture, Assistant Professor); Norman Teague (University of Illinois at Chicago, Assistant Professor in the School of Design); and Lauren Yeager (Cleveland-based sculptor).

Perfected in the United States in the early 1900s, petrochemical polymers known as plastics were embraced as a revolutionary material that protected the natural world and decreased socioeconomic barriers to accessing goods previously only available to the wealthy. Today, despite cultural attitudes towards disposability and evidence of toxicity, plastics are produced at alarmingly exponential rates making clear the urgency to reframe our approach to the overabundance of plastic detritus in our waterways, landfills, and streets. Nationally, Ohio is the second largest employer in the plastics industry, and given Cleveland’s location on the Lake Erie watershed, plastic’s influence is an unavoidable reality in our region.

Each work considers our relationship with plastics, encouraging discussion about the ways the material both shapes and erodes contemporary ecologies, economies, and the built environment, while also suggesting potential alternatives and necessary re-imaginings for the ways in which plastics are deployed. Rather than offering a straightforward critique, Everlasting Plastics considers the material's cultural pervasiveness and the entangled, often paradoxical connection we share with it.

Save the dates:

● Public Opening Celebration: September 26, 2025 | 6:00 - 9:00 pm

● A Plastic Homecoming: Dress Up. Show Up. Support Art. November 1, 5:00 - 10:00 pm. Tickets on sale now!

Everlasting Plastics is co-curated by Tizziana Baldenebro (Executive Director of the Beverly Willis Architecture Foundation), Lauren Leving (Chicago-based independent curator), and Assistant Curator Paula Volpato. The Cleveland presentation of the exhibition is organized by Thea Spittle (SPACES Curatorial Coordinator), the SPACES installation team (Eli Gfell, Susan Danko, Josh Richey, and Karl Anderson), and generously supported by Joseph and Florence Mandel Family Foundation - Beyer Family Fund, Wood-Lee International Art Handler, with in-kind design support from John C. Williams AIA and I.A. Lewin and Associates.

About SPACES

SPACES is a nonprofit alternative art organization in Cleveland, OH, dedicated to supporting artists who explore and experiment. Since 1978, SPACES has commissioned and presented ambitious projects by artists-in-residence working across all media. The organization provides vital resources to cultural producers and offers an inclusive, welcoming space for audiences to engage with bold, experimental ideas.

Major support

Major support for SPACES comes from Andy Warhol Foundation for the Visual Arts, Joseph and Florence Mandel Family Foundation - Beyer Family Fund, The Cleveland Foundation, The Cyrus Eaton Foundation, The Flagstar Foundation, The George Gund Foundation, The Nord Family Foundation, The Teiger Foundation, Patricia & Charles Mintz Philanthropic Fund, Becky Dunn, Northeast Ohio Regional Sewer District and The Joyce Foundation.

Programming is made possible in part by an investment of public funds from the Ohio Arts Council (OAC) and Cuyahoga Arts and Culture. The OAC is a state agency that funds and supports quality arts experiences to strengthen Ohio communities culturally, educationally, and economically.

Community support from FORM, Cleveland Institute of Art, Vedda Printing+, Praxis Fiber Workshop, Morgan Conservatory, Zygote Press, The Cleveland Print Room, The Greater Cleveland Habitat for Humanity ReStore, John C. Williams AIA, Wood-Lee International Art Handler, and individual donors.

Original Article