The UCSB Art, Design & Architecture Museum will open a new exhibition tomorrow titled “The Stumbling Present: Ruins in Contemporary Art,” which focuses on the portrayal of ruins through a haunting lens.

The featured art will include sculpture, film, paintings, documents and photographs of abandoned buildings, decaying installations, crumbling homes, dystopian cityscapes and matter in various stages of degradation. The work seeks to highlight current global instability and chaos to the point of rotting due to terrorism, ecologic issues and economic and political stress.

Ten international artists from regions including the Netherlands, Spain, Cuba, London, New York City, Los Angeles and Mexico City will discuss their work during the opening reception tomorrow from 5:30 to 7:30 p.m.

The museum’s curator of exhibitions Elyse Gonzales said in order to curate the show, she sought to portray the artists’ depictions of ruins as points of intersecting time frames from the “present condition” to the “imagined past” to the “speculative future.”

“In ‘The Stumbling Present,’ I focused on themes of obsolescence and memory, failure and transformation,” Gonzales said in a press release.

Examples of featured artists and their artwork include Valerie Hegarty’s installation, “Ship, Wallpaper and Floorboards with Flood Damage” that she will create on-site, Rob Voerman’s installation, “Building a New Millennium,” which highlights the failure of modernism, and Carlos Bunga’s works showcasing ruination in a neutral light as a transitional period for growth.

“The Stumbling Present” will continue until January 20, 2013. The AD&A Museum will be open Wednesday through Sunday from 12 to 5 p.m. and admission is free.

— Staff report