Existing Conditions

Existing Conditions brings together new work by Louis Meola and Nina Montejano, artists whose practices explore the traces of labor and memory embedded within everyday objects and environments. Coming from backgrounds in printmaking, drawing, and papermaking, the artists attempt to capture the present moment in the ongoing life of the things they are observing—revealing the layers of use and meaning that accumulate over time.

Meola works with collected objects and materials to preserve the tactile inheritance of working-class life. His works transform personal artifacts into vessels of memory, revealing how everyday things can carry both intimate histories and broader cultural narratives.

Montejano reconstructs architectural surfaces through meticulous processes that highlight the labor embedded in the built environment. Her work examines the marks of construction, repair, and wear left behind by anonymous users and craftspeople, bringing attention to the quiet authorship present in the spaces we move through every day.