Art Madrid will celebrate its 18th edition from February 22nd to 26th of 2023 at Palacio de Cibeles' Galería de Cristal, a privileged space in which every year the public can appreciate the most current Spanish and international contemporary art. To celebrate this new meeting, Art Madrid returns to the art week scene with the firm intention of maintaining its work as a reference event within the cultural sector committed to becoming a vehicle for approaching new audiences.

Around 35 national and international galleries, carefully selected by Art Madrid's advisory committee, will make up the General Program. The proposals, marked by experimentation and the plurality of aesthetic discourses, turned the Palacio de Cristal into a window open to all artistic disciplines: painting, sculpture, graphic work, photography, video, installation, performance, digital art... Most of these artworks have been made exclusively for the occasion by the more than 160 artists who will meet on this stage in 2023.

Art Madrid turns eighteen, and coming of age becomes a motivation to take a forceful step toward the future. A time in which the fair wants to continue assisting the call of contemporary art. To achieve this goal, the usual programs have translated into platforms that, from within the event, would give voice to emerging creations, open up to new codes of reception and consumption of works of art and propose closer communication strategies to build the image of the outstanding artists of the edition.

The Curated Program returns for the third time led by curator Natalia Alonso Arduengo. The initiative proposes a thematic journey through pieces that dialogue with problems related to the concept of identity and how the contemporary subject sees himself. But, without a doubt, the highlight will be the presentations of three young artists that Art Madrid has selected to support and add value to the artistic and commercial circuit that the fair has cultivated over the years. At the present time, in which the uses of technologies, use of gender, alienation and uncertainty are part of our daily lives, this initiative is proposed as an institutional support for the development of artists who are beginning their professional careers. The program will be formally articulated with a site-specific installation and two performances that will take place during the fair celebration.

The Interviews Program returns to Art Madrid in its second edition. This time it is structured as a section curated by curator and art critic Alfonso de la Torre. These interviews will revolve around a common theme in which the figure of the artist and their practices in the art market will be the subject. That is how the curator proposes a journey through the works of the chosen artists in which he discovers, in greater depth, the visual universe of the ten most outstanding creators of Art Madrid'23. Starting in January, we will enjoy two weekly written interviews on the web and on the rest of the fair's communication channels, where we will see the results in video formats.

One Shot collectors Program returns to the fair with the commitment to continue building bridges to bring the public closer to contemporary art and the promotion of collecting at a national and international level. This initiative aims at professionals in the sector and lovers of contemporary art who are considering to start collecting. Led by Ana Suárez Gisbert, art advisor and appraiser, Art Madrid offers a free advisory service on the acquisition of works of art for the interested public.

During these eighteen years, Art Madrid has distinguished itself for its constant and responsible work with various agents of the national cultural network, the honesty and transparency with its loyal galleries, and the support for new gallery models. Aware of the importance of an event of this nature, Art Madrid proposes a plural edition, adapted to the new artistic languages ​​and committed to society, all practices in which the creative spirit of its organization is recognized.

List of confirmed galleries for Art Madrid'23

Nationals: BAT Alberto Cornejo (Madrid), Flecha (Madrid), Arma Gallery (Madrid), DDR (Madrid), Marita Segovia (Madrid), Galería Hispánica (Madrid/CDMX), 3 Punts (Barcelona), Inéditad (Barcelona), N2 Galería (Barcelona), Out of Africa Gallery (Sitges/London), Uxval Gochez (Barcelona), Aurora Vigil-Escalera (Gijón), Arancha Osoro (Oviedo), Bea Villamarín (Gijón); Alba Cabrera (Valencia), Shiras Galería (Valencia), Dr. Robot (Valencia), Luisa Pita (Santiago de Compostela), Galería Metro (Santiago de Compostela), MoretArt (A Coruña), Rodrigo Juarranz (Aranda de Duero, Burgos), Espiral (Noja, Cantabria), Kur Art Gallery (San Sebastián, Vasc Country), La Aurora (Murcia), MA Arte Contemporáneo (Mallorca) y Manuel Ojeda (Canary Islands).

Internationals: Galerie LJ (Paris), Galleria Stefano Forni (Bologna), Michael Schmalfuss (Berlin), Yiri Arts (Taiwan), Sâo Mamede (Lisbon), Trema arte contemporânea (Lisbon), ArtLounge (Lisbon), Nuno Sacramento (Ílhavo, Portugal) y Collage Habana (La Habana).

The work of Cedric Le Corf (Bühl, Germany, 1985) is situated in a territory of friction, where the archaic impulse of the sacred coexists with a critical sensibility characteristic of contemporary times. His practice is grounded in an anthropological understanding of the origin of art as a foundational gesture: the trace, the mark, the need to inscribe life in the face of the awareness of death.

The artist establishes a complex dialogue with the Spanish Baroque tradition, not through stylistic mimicry, but through the emotional and material intensity that permeates that aesthetic. The theatricality of light, the embodiment of tragedy, and the hybridity of the spiritual and the carnal are translated in his work into a formal exploration, where underlying geometry and embedded matter generate perceptual tension.

In Le Corf’s practice, the threshold between abstraction and figuration is not an opposition but a site of displacement. Spatial construction and color function as emotional tools that destabilize the familiar. An open methodology permeates this process, in which planning coexists with a deliberate loss of control. This allows the work to emerge as a space of silence, withdrawal, and return, where the artist confronts his own interiority.

The Fall. 2025. Oil on canvas.195 × 150 cm.

In your work, a tension can be perceived between devotion and dissidence. How do you negotiate the boundary between the sacred and the profane?

In my work, I feel the need to return to rock art, to the images I carry with me. From the moment prehistoric humans became aware of death, they felt the need to leave a trace—marking a red hand on the cave wall using a stencil, a symbol of vital blood. Paleolithic man, a hunter-gatherer, experienced a mystical feeling in the presence of the animal—a form of spiritual magic and rituals linked to creation. In this way, the cave becomes sacred through the abstract representation of death and life, procreation, the Venus figures… Thus, art is born. In my interpretation, art is sacred by essence, because it reveals humankind as a creator.

Between Dog and Wolf II. 2025. Oil on canvas. 97 × 70 cm.

Traces of the Spanish Baroque tradition can be seen in your work. What do you find in it that remains contemporary today?

Yes, elements of the Spanish Baroque tradition are present in my work. In the history of art, for example, I think of Arab-Andalusian mosaics, in which I find a geometry of forms that feels profoundly contemporary. In Spanish Baroque painting and sculpture, one recurring theme is tragedy: death and the sacred are intensely embodied, whether in religious or profane subjects, in artists such as Zurbarán, Ribera, El Greco, and also Velázquez. I am thinking, for example, of the remarkable equestrian painting of Isabel of France, with its geometry and nuanced portrait that illuminates the painting.

When I think about sculpture, the marvelous polychrome sculptures of Alonso Cano, Juan de Juni, or Pedro de Mena come to mind—works in which green eyes are inlaid, along with ivory teeth, horn fingernails, and eyelashes made of hair. All of this has undoubtedly influenced my sculptural practice, both in its morphological and equestrian dimensions. Personally, in my work I inlay porcelain elements into carved or painted wood.

Between Dog and Wolf I. 2025. Oil on canvas. 97 × 70 cm.

What interests you about that threshold between the recognizable and the abstract?

For me, any representation in painting or sculpture is abstract. What imposes itself is the architectural construction of space, its secret geometry, and the emotion produced by color. It is, in a way, a displacement of the real in order to reach that sensation.

The Anatomical Angel. 2013. Ash wood and porcelain. 90 × 15 × 160 cm.

Your work seems to move between silence, abandonment, and return. What draws you toward these intermediate spaces?

I believe it is by renouncing the imitation of external truth, by refusing to copy it, that I reach truth—whether in painting or in sculpture. It is as if I were looking at myself within my own subject in order to better discover my secret, perhaps.

Justa. 2019. Polychrome oak wood. 240 × 190 × 140 cm.

To what extent do you plan your work, and how much space do you leave for the unexpected—or even for mistakes?

It is true that, on occasions, I completely forget the main idea behind my painting and sculpture. Although I begin a work with very clear ideas—preliminary drawings and sketches, preparatory engravings, and a well-defined intention—I realize that, sometimes, that initial idea gets lost. It is not an accident. In some cases, it has to do with technical difficulties, but nowadays I also accept starting from a very specific idea and, when faced with sculpture, wood, or ceramics, having to work in a different way. I accept that.