en caminos, Edith Farnsworth House, Plano, Illinois, 2026. © Noel Mercado.
Within the context of the exhibition en caminos on view at the Edith Farnsworth House between March 25 and June 14, 2026, curator Alivé Piliado, artist and craftsman Noel Mercado, and Iker Gil of MAS Context will delve into the intersections of architectural history, modernism, and contemporary artistic interventions at historic sites.
Through their dialogue, the speakers will explore how today’s practitioners engage with and reinterpret the past—reframing, activating, and transforming spaces layered with memory and meaning. This program is a must‑attend for anyone interested in architecture, art, preservation, and the evolving life of historic places.
About the exhibition
en caminos introduces a new body of work that engages directly with the existing interior of Farnsworth House by repurposing and reupholstering sourced designs by Ludwig Mies van der Rohe. 2026 Artist in Residence, Noel Mercado, replaces the upholstery of select furniture with textiles and leather brought from his family’s home state of Jalisco, Mexico, drawing from tablecloths, repurposed bags, belts, and leather remnants shaped by traditions of domestic making and repair. These materials carry generational knowledge formed through labor, migration, and resourcefulness, forms of expertise frequently excluded from canonical histories of modernist design. By situating these transformed works within the house, Mercado inserts himself and the historical path behind him into the conversation, expanding it to include overlooked histories that have long existed in parallel with modernist design.
Curated in collaboration with Alivé Piliado, the exhibition extends into the Gallery to encounter Mercado’s methods, process, and original furniture designs. This presentation traces his approach to material translation and demonstrates how his practice moves between sourcing, reworking, and careful minute craft. Through subtle yet deliberate interventions, Mercado redirects attention toward questions of cultural identity and migration, allowing inherited knowledge to sit visibly within a space historically defined by architectural purity and restraint. en caminos offers a thoughtful reflection on authorship, identity, and design, demonstrating how contemporary practice can dialogue with modernism while reshaping its narrative from within.
