One of the attractions of art is the possibility of hosting proposals that exceed the limits of the possible, that allow creations that extend the contours of reality, that play with the implausible, the hypothetical, the impossible and the extraordinary. Many authors follow this impulse because the feasible and the near remain small and need to give way to ambitions that think big.

Anish Kapoor, “Leviathan”, 2011 (via thehardt.com)

In this search for new formats and forms of expression, there are two main challenges, on the one hand, the location of the works, since some great ideas cannot fit within a closed space, and on the other, the choice of execution materials. One of the best-known ways to overcome these barriers is mural art, with no restrictions other than the size of the wall or building to be intervened and with the use of a classical technique such as painting.

JR, “The secret of the great pyramid”, 2019 (via designboom.com)

However, mural painting is intimately connected with urban art and can have connotations that contemporary artists try to avoid. Therefore, new proposals for intervention in the public space arise, which often take advantage of the architectural elements of the cities to develop the pieces. A well-known example of this is the work of the Boa Mistura collective, which disseminates word puzzles on facades, stairs, benches, lampposts and other elements to create optical tricks that encourage the viewer to participate and to look for the correct angle to read the message. With optical illusions also dares Jean René (known as JR) a French urban artist who came to make this spectacular composition for the Louvre Museum. This work, formed with 2,000 sheets of printed paper and placed with a degradable glue, lasted just 24 hours. As JR himself said “The images, like life, are ephemeral. Once pasted, the art piece lives on its own.”

Jeff Koons, “Seated Ballerina”, 2017, ©Photo: Tom Powel (vía www.architecturaldigest.com)

KAWS, Massive Inflatable Sculpture in Hong Kong’s Victoria Harbour (via www.thisiscolossal.com)

Likewise, there are also who want to work with new forms and materials to avoid logistical limitations in the construction of their works. This is what happens with inflatable sculptures, a fashion that many contemporary creators have joined since it is a more affordable method, lightens the weight of the pieces, allows their transportation after disassembly, and also makes it possible to occupy spaces each time Older and more ambitious. In addition to the impressive “Monumenta” that Anish Kapoor installed in 2011 at the Grand Palais (and this is not the only giant inflatable work of this author), we also highlight the proposal of Jeff Koons, for the Rockefeller Center square. Besides, artists like Kaws also dare with this format, with impressive results.

Emmanuelle Moureaux, “‘Universe of Words”, 140,000 Pieces of Paper Form a Colorful Installation for the Tanabata Festival ©Photo: Daisuke Shima

On the other hand, other creators dare to redesign the exhibition halls with immersive installations that completely change the perception of space, and even of reality. A recent trend is to use threads and fabrics to provide volatile networks and structures that expand through the ceiling and the walls. These works produce a diverse effect; some resemble the interior of a living organ, others remind us of the flow of water, and others create a feeling of being somewhere else as if we lived in a parallel dimension.

Chiharu Shiota, “Counting Memories”, installation for the Muzeum Śląskie

All these proposals play with temporality and are designed to produce a passing effect. The ephemeral life of large-scale works never seen before.

Daniel Barrio. Guest artist of the third edition of OPEN BOOTH. Courtesy of the artist.

DESPIECE. PROTOCOLO DE MUTACIÓN

As part of the Art Madrid’26 Parallel Program, we present the third edition of Open Booth, a space conceived as a platform for artistic creation and contemporary experimentation. The initiative focuses on artists who do not yet have representation within the gallery circuit, offering a high-visibility professional context in which new voices can develop their practice, explore forms of engagement with audiences, and consolidate their presence within the current art scene. On this occasion, the project features artist Daniel Barrio (Cuba, 1988), who presents the site-specific work Despiece. Protocolo de mutación.

Daniel Barrio’s practice focuses on painting as a space for experimentation, from which he explores the commodification of social life and the tyranny of media approval. He works with images drawn from the press and other media, intervening in them pictorially to disrupt their original meaning. Through this process, the artist opens up new readings and questions how meaning is produced, approaching painting as a space of realization, therapy, and catharsis.

Despiece. Protocolo de mutación is built from urban remnants, industrial materials, and fragments of history, inviting us to reflect on which memories we inherit, which we consume, and which ones we are capable of creating. Floors, walls, and volumes come together to form a landscape under tension, where the sacred coexists with the everyday, and where cracks matter more than perfection.

The constant evolution of art calls for ongoing exchange between artists, institutions, and audiences. In its 21st edition, Art Madrid reaffirms its commitment to acting as a catalyst for this dialogue, expanding the traditional boundaries of the art fair context and opening up new possibilities of visibility for emerging practices.

Despiece. Protocolo de mutación emerges from a critical and affective impulse to dismantle, examine, and reassemble what shapes us culturally and personally. The work is conceived as an inseparable whole: an inner landscape that operates as a device of suspicion, where floors, walls, and volumes configure an ecosystem of remnants. It proposes a reading of history not as a linear continuity, but as a system of forces in permanent friction, articulating space as an altered archive—a surface that presents itself as definitive while remaining in constant transformation.

The work takes shape as a landscape constructed from urban waste, where floors, walls, and objects form a unified body made of lime mortar, PVC from theatrical signage, industrial foam, and offering wax. At the core of the project is an L-shaped structure measuring 5 × 3 meters, which reinterprets the fresco technique on reclaimed industrial supports. The mortar is applied wet over continuous working days, without a pursuit of perfection, allowing the material to reveal its own character. Orbiting this structure are architectural fragments: foam blocks that simulate concrete, a 3D-printed and distorted Belvedere torso, and a wax sculptural element embedded with sandpaper used by anonymous workers and artists, preserving the labor of those other bodies.

A white wax sculptural element functions within the installation as a point of sensory concentration that challenges the gaze. Inside it converge the accumulated faith of offering candles and the industrial residues of the studio, recalling that purity and devotion coexist with the materiality of everyday life. The viewer’s experience thus moves beyond the visual: bending down, smelling, and approaching its vulnerability transforms perception into an intimate, embodied act. Embedded within its density are sanding blocks used by artists, artisans, and laborers, recovered from other contexts, where the sandpaper operates as a trace of the effort of other bodies, following a protocol of registration with no autobiographical intent.

Despiece. Protocolo de mutación addresses us directly, asking: which memory do we value—the one we consume, or the one we construct with rigor? The audience leaves behind a purely contemplative position to become part of the system, as the effort of moving matter, documentary rigor, and immersive materiality form a body of resistance against a mediated reality. The project thus takes shape as an inner landscape, where floor, surface, and volume articulate an anatomy of residues. Adulteration operates as an analytical methodology applied to the layers of urban reality, intervening in history through theatrical and street advertising, architectural remnants, and administrative protocols, proposing that art can restore the capacity to build one’s own memory, even if inevitably fragmented.

ABOUT THE ARTIST

DANIEL BARRIO (1988, Cuba)

Daniel Barrio (Cienfuegos, Cuba, 1988) is a visual artist whose practice articulates space through painting, understanding the environment as an altered archive open to critical intervention. He studied at the Academy of Fine Arts of Cienfuegos (2004–2008), specializing in painting, and later at the Madrid Film School (ECAM, 2012–2015), where he studied Art Direction. His methodology integrates visual thinking with scenographic narrative.

His trajectory includes solo exhibitions such as La levedad en lo cotidiano (Galería María Porto, Madrid, 2023), Interiores ajenos (PlusArtis, Madrid, 2022), and Tribud (Navel Art, Madrid, 2019), as well as significant group exhibitions including Space is the Landscape (Estudio Show, Madrid, 2024), Winterlinch (Espacio Valverde Gallery, Madrid, 2024), Hiberia (Galería María Porto, Lisbon, 2023), and the traveling exhibition of the La Rioja Young Art Exhibition (2022).

A member of the Resiliencia Collective, his work does not pursue the production of objects but rather the articulation of pictorial devices that generate protocols of resistance against the flow of disposable images. In a context saturated with immediate data, his practice produces traces and archives what must endure, questioning not the meaning of the work itself but the memory the viewer constructs through interaction—thus reclaiming sovereignty over the gaze and inhabiting ruins as a method for understanding the present.