Art Madrid'26 – Alex Katz This Is Now in Guggenheim Bilbao

 

Portraits of women and landscapes, are the favorite genres of the artist Alex Katz (Brooklyn, 1927), who visited Bilbao last time in 2012 with the exhibition "Smiles". Now, entitled "Alex Katz: This is Now", a solo exhibition shows the way to understand the landscape of one of the most outstanding contemporary artists in American art.

 

 

This Is Now are 35 large works with which Katz wants to represent things, spaces, as they are, as he sees them and feels them. "Rather than representing images of a faithful manner, Katz interested capture the instant of perception. It's like an explosive flash before the picture is focused, it is what he calls 'the present time', "explained from the museum.

 

 

The exhibition shows the different stages (covering the last 25 years of the painter) in which the artist has cultivated the genre of landscape, from the eighties creations to his late paintings of monumental landscapes made today. Paintings with powerful mass of color, full of poetry, works that invite us to reflect on the perception and awareness "about the relationship between art and nature, and the notion of the sublime in our time," he explained at the Guggenheim.

 

 

 

Katz recent landscapes are the pinnacle of his refined style, with descriptive and clean lines, in which the potential of contemporary art is to capture the grandeur embodied in the present. Her landscapes speak of the condition of being in an environment of constant movement and confluence of images, also about the inability to focus attention on the life and circumstances and seek to define a pictorial space that forces us to perceive detail, the relationship between art and nature.

Organized by the High Museum of Art in Atlanta, you can enjoy "Alex Katz: This is Now" until February 7, 2016.

 


ART MADRID’ 26: 21 YEARS OF CONTEMPORARY ART


Discover all the information about the artists and galleries participating in the 21st edition of Art Madrid. The catalog features a curated selection of the works presented in this edition, along with the most relevant details of the event, making it an essential tool for engaging with the fair’s key figures and exploring the defining elements of today’s art scene.


In 2026, Art Madrid celebrates its 21st edition, further establishing itself as a leading event within Spain’s cultural sector. From March 4 to 8, the Galería de Cristal of the Palacio de Cibeles will once again become a meeting point for galleries, collectors, artists, and contemporary art enthusiasts.


Over the past twenty-one years, the fair has evolved into a dynamic and ever-expanding platform, fostering diversity in artistic languages, techniques, and discourses. In this edition, the Galleries Program brings together around 35 exhibitors from more than seven countries, offering a representative overview of the most recent developments in contemporary creation.


The Art Madrid ’26 catalog serves as a key publication for discovering the work of this edition’s galleries and artists —marked by experimentation and a plurality of perspectives— while also documenting the conceptual axes that shape the fair. As part of the Parallel Program, INHABITING THE EPHEMERAL: A Reflection on the “Species” of Spaces proposes a reflection on space, relationships, and shared experience, expanding the understanding of the fair beyond its commercial dimension and highlighting its cultural and experiential significance.


In addition, the catalog presents the initiatives that complete the program, such as the Open Booth dedicated to emerging creation, the Nebrija Space in collaboration with Nebrija University, the Performance Series “Open Infinite. What the Body Remembers,” the One Shot Collectors Program, and the Patronage Program, reaffirming the fair’s commitment to supporting, mediating, and accompanying contemporary art at every stage.

We invite you to discover more about Art Madrid ’26 through the catalog of its 21st edition — a publication that, beyond serving as documentary memory, becomes a cartography of the present artistic moment and an open door to new ways of inhabiting contemporary art.