ART FAIRS: Art Madrid 2023

Art Madrid, the most important contemporary art fair in the Spanish capital, celebrates its 18 anniversary this year with an edition that is more dynamic and transgressive than ever with changes that promise to please all attendees and participants. The fair defines itself as an open and global proposal that offers the perfect opportunity to discover and acquire singular works covering all disciplines.

By Efi Michalarou
Photo: Art Madrid Archive

Art Madrid’s Selection Committee has assessed the set of proposals to offer a high artistic quality in its programming and for visitors to enjoy an extensive overview of the most up-to-date contemporary art. The new edition of ART MADRID features 9 international galleries from France, Portugal, Italy, Germany, Taiwan, and Cuba, with 26 galleries from all over Spain. This edition stands out for its impact on the latest artistic trends. The participating galleries offer the opportunity to see the great works that some of their artists have completed in this last year, a time that has served for research and reflection with creative results that will have a great impression on the contemporary art market. The international galleries that will participate in ART MADRID’23 are: Galerie LJ, Galleria Stefano Forni, Michael Schmalfuss, Yiri Arts, Sâo Mamede, Trema arte contemporânea, ArtLounge, Nuno Sacramento and Collage Habana. Natalia Alonso Arduengo is in charge of articulating a Curated Program around the theme of Identity, which presents three young artists outside the commercial circuit to make their work known to a broad audience, such as the one that brings together an art fair. Natalia Alonso Arduengo will analyze the concept of identity in a contemporary age marked by alienation, the uses of technology, and the claims of gender, class, and race. How do we see ourselves? What image do we project? Who do we want to be? What social conventions impose a particular way of being in the world? Can we generate a new conception of the self? Until now, the Curated Program has included the work, on the one hand, of Agnes Essonti Luque (Barcelona, 1996), a Cameroonian and Spanish artist who grew up in a multicultural environment closely connected to her African roots. Now she lives and works in l’Hospitalet de Llobregat, and her work focuses on issues such as Afro-diasporic identities, culture, and race. On the other, Dela Delos (Oviedo, 1992), whose work investigates the generational question, explores commonplaces and borderlines between social constructs and patterns of expectations. As in the last edition, Natalia Alonso will carry out a curated tour. It starts from a selection of works from the stands of the participating galleries, configuring an itinerary to follow under the discourse of Identity. ART MADRID presents for the second consecutive “Art&Collect: your work in one click”, an initiative created in collaboration with the galleries that make up the general program of ART MADRID’23. This digital initiative aims to bring the latest contemporary art to all audiences. Through the fair’s online store, it will be possible to access more than 40 works whose value ranges between 800 and 1800 euros.  The selection includes the different disciplines that will articulate the next edition of ART MADRID, and offers us a preview of the artists who will attend with their galleries. You can find pieces such as the photographs by Xurxo Gómez-Chao that review classical culture and art history, or those by David Delgado Ruiz, which show a created and documented “intervened reality”. The selection shows how painting is the protagonist and is positioned as the fashionable discipline and most present in the current context: Julien Primard takes us into his dream scenes through an aesthetically contemporary filter; while Cristina Gamón floods her abstractions on methacrylate with color. On the other hand, the work on paper allows us to delight in the delicate and symbolist drawing of Juanjo Martínez Cánovas. The experimentation in the use of materials and techniques is evident in the creation of Francesca Poza from tarlatan or in the use of metal in the realistic buildings of Nicolás Lisardo. The representation of disciplines ends with the marble sculpture expertise of Carlos Andrade or the pop figures of Fidia Falaschetti.

Photo: Art Madrid Archive

Info: Art Madrid 2023, Galería de Cristal de CentroCentro Cibeles, 1 Montalbán St., near Plaza de Cibeles 1, Madrid, Spain, Duration: 22-26/2/2023, Days & Hours: 11:00-21:00, Admission: General Ticket: 15€, Reduced Ticket (people over 65y, unemployed, students and groups (20 minimum)): 12€, Children up to 12y free, www.art-madrid.com/