Join us for the launch of UR 11, From Mall to Prison: El Helicoide's Downward Spiral, edited by Celeste Olalquiaga and Lisa Blackmore.
One of Latin America’s most striking modernist ventures, El Helicoide—Venezuela’s spiraling 1950s drive-in shopping center— is a futuristic fantasy gone sour. This book traces the building’s six decades of failed projects, its paradoxical relationship with the surrounding slums, and its problematic status as a police headquarters since 1985. With breathtaking range—from archival documentation to comic commentary, literary excerpts, and critical analysis by historians, academics and artists—the book addresses El Helicoide as a “living ruin” emblematic of the contradictions of modernity.