"It is essential that artist and curator walk hand in hand, it’s the most exciting part of this work."

The curator and independent art critic Nerea Ubieto takes over from the ONE PROJECT Program of Art Madrid'19. Fresh air and a personal and philosophical narrative to enrich this "showcase of young talents".

For those who don’t know yet what an art curator does and what its role is, could you tell us in your words what you do and what is the function of a curator?

A curator is a connector of aesthetic ideas, a mediator in the broadest and most positive sense of the word: he establishes links between artists and the public, the artwork and space, between the pieces that are part of an exhibition, between the discourse of the artists and other possible speeches... I used to like the definition of the curator as an "ideologist of an exhibition" because it emphasises the reflexive question as opposed to the purely practical, something like a visual philosopher. However, nowadays I find it a bit pretentious and short. The discourse is necessarily forged from the conversations and the exchange with the female artists, therefore, they also "think" the exhibition. It is essential that artist and curator walk hand in hand, it’s the most exciting part of this work. On the other hand, the exhibition is not the only format to channel these artistic connections; there are other ways, visible and invisible. I believe that, currently, reinventing these formats and strategies is a primary task. We have to rethink our function a lot, broaden horizons of action, mix and open ourselves in collaborative ways.

  Thinking about the public that visits an art fair or an exhibition… what does this curated perspective provide?

Reaching an audience - of all kinds - is very important the way I understand the curatorial practice. I want to believe that the curated perspective has a lot to offer, first of all, a new look regarding the relationships that may occur between the proposed works. This vision facilitates - but does not make it easy - that the spectator establishes its own interconnections. The curatorial context, extensive reading and, why not, generates an attractive speech that can serve as a hook for an audience that otherwise would not have approached certain speeches. In my opinion, the curated perspective should bring the viewer closer. I try not to lose sight of this and imagine what my parents would think when they come to the exhibition.

“A curator is a connector of aesthetic ideas, a mediator in the broadest and most positive sense of the word: he establishes links between artists and the public, the artwork and space, between the pieces that are part of an exhibition, between the discourse of the artists and other possible speeches”.

  The "discourse" is the great contemporary theme... Do you have a discursive fetish? What topics interest you?

I'm not usually closed to anything because, even the topics that interest me less at the beginning, pose a challenge and involve unforeseen learning, but yes, I have preferences... In my projects, I usually work with philosophical bias, especially the personal identity understood in a broad way, from the recesses of nineteenth-century interiority to digital exteriority. Problems around feminism, queer, expanded corporalities, sensory experience, new materialisms, phenomenology... it's very difficult to define, I am passionate about many subjects!

  It must be complicated to get a reflexive pause before a work in these days of continuous news, haste and oversaturation of images ... How do you do it /try it?

Yes, it’s tremendously difficult, even more if you have a mind that doesn’t rest... I get it by forcing me to stop, specifically through yoga, practice to which I try to dedicate a time every day.

  What is the role of fairs on the stage of contemporary art?

Serve as a showcase, take the pulse of current art, promote the work of artists and, of course, sell it!

“In my projects, I usually work with philosophical bias, especially the personal identity understood in a broad way, from the recesses of nineteenth-century interiority to digital exteriority”.

  How do you approach your incorporation to the Art Madrid team? What will you contribute to your program with?

With excitement, but also as a challenge. Curating within a fair is complicated because of undergoing factors that are beyond my control and go beyond the curatorial work: the commercial part, the competition between the fairs, prejudices, fears... I’m aware that dealing with all this is tricky.

I will contribute giving the best of me, presenting interesting proposals and betting on a project 100% female artists. The goal is to radically balance a percentage that has never been on our side. Also, I think the selection is going to happen naturally since the vast majority of artists I've worked with this year are women.

  How do you understand the ONE PROJECT Program and how do you value the work of Carlos Delgado Mayordomo, the curator that you relieve?

I understand it as a necessary window and an opportunity for artists who are emerging and need a push. Beyond the possible sales and the visibility that a fair brings, being part of a curated program is a plus for the artist since it means going hand in hand with someone who believes and bets for her work. Also, my intention is to work with these artists outside the fair. With regard to Carlos, I can only assess in positive: I admire his curatorial work in general and the work he has done with the One Project during these 5 years, despite the difficulty. I hope to be up to the task.

  BIO NEREA UBIETO:

Zaragoza, 1984. Graduated in Art History from the University of Zaragoza, she works as an independent curator, manager and critic in various art publications. Among her last exhibitions they stand out: "Return Flight Tickets" in the gallery Max Star (Madrid); "The invisible threat" in Sala Amadis (Madrid); "The place where I live" in Galería Ponce Robles (Madrid) or "Keep calm and carry on", inaugurated in Tabacalera Madrid and itinerant by the AECID Cultural Centers Network in Latin America. She has recently been selected in the 2017 V.O. of curator of Valencia with her project "Artfulness" that will take place during September 2018. Among the awards and grants received are: the Residence Scholarship abroad of the Community of Madrid, developed in HIAP-Helsinki International Artist Program (2016); the International Award Exhibition of the CPR (2016), or the international residency Curatorial Program of Research in Estonia and Finland (2015). She is a regular contributor to the cultural television program Metropolis. She combines her work as an independent curator with cultural management, teaching and other projects in the artistic field.

Art Madrid celebrates its twenty years of contemporary art in 2025, establishing itself as a key event within the cultural sector in Spain. For its 20th edition, the fair will feature a Gallery Program with thirty-four national and international exhibitors, along with an extensive Parallel Program focused on the conceptual theme: City Territory. Here, we share all the details we've prepared for our upcoming encounter with contemporary art.

The public space, the city, and territory will be the concepts around which the different specialized agents in the sector will present their visions on how artistic practices impact the urban environment. The sensory experience will be fundamental in shaping the work that explores the connections between art, territory as a liminal space, and the city as a sensitive social agora. The activities developed in the Parallel Program will serve as a bridge to practices emerging from shifting identities and spatial imaginaries that revitalize the cultural geography of Madrid. The city, understood as a permeable organism and a topography of shared meanings, becomes the stage for a sensitive exploration of the impact of art on the spaces we inhabit.

CHOU Ching Hui. A Promised Land. The Planet of Angels No.5. Photography. 2024.

The concept of territory, a blurred boundary between the public and the private, takes on new meanings when artistic practices address the invisible traces of everyday life. The streets, squares, and corners of Madrid are reimagined as symbolic landscapes that challenge the familiar gaze. Here, the city is a palimpsest where the gestures of the past engage in conversation with visions of a future still under construction. In this setting, the sensory experience becomes a bridge connecting the ephemeral with the enduring, the intimate with the collective.

The activities of the Parallel Program not only offer a physical journey through spaces transformed by art but also invite deep reflection on the shifting identities that emerge within the urban fabric. From performances that reimagine the boundaries of civic experience to installations that revitalize spatial imaginaries, each proposal challenges us with essential questions: What does it mean to inhabit? How do we reinterpret common spaces?

The dialogue between art and the city that takes place in Art Madrid is also an invitation to rethink the cultural geography of the capital. Madrid, in its heterogeneity, is a map in constant flux, where memory and invention intertwine. In this context, art acts as a cartographer, tracing new paths of meaning that enrich the experience of those who walk through them. On every corner, on every wall that speaks through an artistic intervention, the city reinvents itself as a sensitive space, a territory where creativity becomes the common language of its citizens.

TENG Pu Chun.The red bridge beyond a glass panel. Mixed media on canvas. 2024.

It happens with cities as with dreams: everything imaginable can be dreamed, but even the most unexpected dream is a riddle that hides a desire, or its inverse, a fear. Cities, like dreams, are built of desires and fears, although the thread of their discourse is secret, their rules absurd, their perspectives misleading, and everything hides another. — I have neither desires nor fears —declared the Khan—, and my dreams are composed either by the mind or by chance. — Cities, too, believe they are the work of the mind or of chance, but neither one nor the other is enough to keep their walls standing. Of a city, you do not enjoy the seven or the seventy-seven wonders, but the answer it gives to a question of yours. (Italo Calvino. Invisible Cities)

Federico Uribe. Still life. Bullet casings. 2020.

The Parallel Program of Art Madrid'25 reaffirms its commitment to accessibility and bringing contemporary art closer to all audiences. It fosters institutional collaboration as a driver of positive change in the art scene and renews its presence as a key event during Madrid's Art Week. On this occasion, some of the activities of the Parallel Program are curated by Mario Gutiérrez Cru, a collaboration between Art Madrid, KREAE, and Proyector.

The Parallel Program of Art Madrid'25 features a variety of proposals that will take place in the days leading up to the fair and during the event itself at the Galería de Cristal in the Palacio de Cibeles:

Before the fair (February 28 / March 1 and 2)

Dialoga Ciudad (February 28):

Poetry in motion. Poetic actions that turn public space into a stage where the everyday meets the sublime. In various parts of the city, itinerant poetry will mediate the interactions that pedestrians establish in the public space. Through ephemeral interventions in strategic points around the city, participants explore the potential of poetry as a tool for emotional and social communication that disrupts the urban landscape.

Invited artists: Ajo y Peru; Helena Mariño y Enri La Forêt.

Iyán Castaño Circular currents in time. Mixed media on canvas. 2024.

Arquitecturas Imaginadas (February 28):

Metro stations are reinvented through interventions by artists who invite us to engage in a dialogue about urban movement interactions. These actions seek to redefine the traveler's experience, promoting the perception of the metro not just as functional infrastructure, but as a cultural space and site for social interaction. This approach aims to spark a deep reflection on public mobility and the value of shared spaces, emphasizing the role of art in transforming urban sensibilities, within an educational initiative aimed at raising citizen awareness about the shared use of territory.

Invited artists: Ana Matey; Domix Garrido; Araceli López y Andrés Montes.

La Quedada (March 1 - 2):

Professional visits to artist studios and creative spaces. A circuit of professional visits to artist studios and creative spaces, exploring territories of care and connections between the center and the periphery. This tour invites participants to discover the environments where projects imagining alternative futures are conceived, fostering dialogue and creative exchange. It's an opportunity to explore the creative processes of invited artists firsthand.

Invited artists: Boa Mistura; Todoporlapraxis; Mateo Maté; C.A.R.y Laura Lío.

Veljko Vuckovic. Subordination. Oil on canvas. 2022.

During the fair (March 5 - 9)

Ciudad Sutil:

Susi Vetter leads this augmented reality experience on Montalbán street, designed to intervene on Montalbán street, the main entrance to the fair, with the goal of offering a sublimated vision of the urban environment and the city's landscape. The proposal invites the public to discover an alternative layer of reality through technology.

Invited artist: Susi Vetter.

Open Booth:

In collaboration with Nebrija University, it offers a space dedicated to emerging artists to exhibit their works within the professional contemporary art circuit. This will be the second edition of the initiative with which Art Madrid renews its commitment to emerging creation, providing a white cube for an artistic intervention inspired by the key concepts of the Parallel Program of the fair. This year, the project Bajotierras/Sobrenubes. (DEL OSO, UN PELO), curated by Luis Gárciga, will be a collective exhibition that will enhance the dialogue between different emerging artists.

Raíces Afuera. Performance Program:

Five women artists address migration, uprooting, and the weight of alienation in a performance program that takes as its starting point Simone Weil's book "Rooting" (Trotta, 2014), to explore the notion of belonging and the need for rooting in a contemporary world characterized by fragmentation, displacement, and disconnection. The project is set within the fair's context as a critical and reflective space that challenges the relationship between the individual and their environment, community, and sense of identity.

Invited artists: Josefina Bardi; Eléonore Ozanne; Valentina Alvarado Matos; Ra Asensi y Agustina Palazzo.

Lecturas. Recorridos comisariados:

A cultural mediation project designed to bring the public closer to the works that will be displayed in the galleries participating in Art Madrid'25. For this occasion, Eugenia Tenenbaum and Clara González Freyre de Andrade invite us to discover new perspectives on contemporary art through carefully designed itineraries to bring us closer to the exhibition proposals of this edition.

Tiffany Alfonseca. The Trinity (Bochinche). Acrylic, pencils, rhinestones on canvas. 2024.

Espacio Tectónica:

A versatile space within the fair that will host an international video art cycle curated by Mario Gutiérrez Cru, featuring international audiovisual artists. This cycle will address key themes such as migration, territoriality, and the dynamics between centers and peripheries, reflecting on the city as a labyrinth or Tower of Babel, as well as on the role of the individual in relation to new architectural icons. Through video pieces, the artists explore how the relationships between peripheries and urban centers are interrelated in a globalized context, reflecting technological and social phenomena, such as semiconductor production in Taiwan or landscape transformation in Brazil. The pieces, combining moving images and sound, aim to generate deep reflection on the interaction between urban spaces, nature, climate disasters, and the contemporary perception of the environment.

Invited artists: lololol - Xia Lin & Sheryl Cheung; Tezi Gabundia; Ilaria Di Carlo; Magda Gebhardt; Yuchi Hsiao; Juan Carlos Bracho y Lukas Marxt.

Sección 20 Grados:

A cycle of interventions to be held in the Tectonics Space. For this occasion, ten artists will be invited whose research focuses on the dialogue between art and urban spaces. The proposals will explore how artistic practices can question the social structure of cities and the ways individuals relate to urban architecture and territories. The selected projects will materialize into ephemeral interventions and presentations reflecting on these themes.

Invited artists: Susi Vetter; Helena Goñi; Paula Lafuente; Amaya Hernández; Elena Arroyo; Olga Mesa ; Deneb Martos; Guillermo G. Peydró & Jeanne de Petricomi; Sergio Muro y Javier Olivera.

Carolina Bazo. Selva Roja Photo performance, printed on cotton paper. 2022.

In this edition, Art Madrid celebrates two decades of support and promotion of contemporary art, reaffirming its role as a catalyst for change, reflection, and artistic creation. The Parallel Program, presented as the most ambitious initiative of this edition, embodies our commitment to innovation and collaboration. With the participation of more than thirty artists, it becomes an enriching space for exchange that goes beyond the conventional boundaries of the market, expanding the frontiers of art, exploring new dynamics, and opening space for social critique and the most radical creativity.

This program would not be possible without the active collaboration of galleries, institutions, and artists who, year after year, have believed in Art Madrid's ability to make a real impact on the art scene. Through this program, we reaffirm our belief that art is a means to question, transform, and connect, beyond commercial dynamics and in tune with the social and cultural changes that define our era.

Aware of the challenge of maintaining the relevance of an event like ours, this edition presents a true reflection of our ability to adapt and be proactive in creating an inclusive, accessible space open to the new voices that are charting the course of contemporary art. Thus, Art Madrid reaffirms itself as an indisputable benchmark in the cultural scene, committed to innovation and the promotion of an artistic practice that continues to evolve relentlessly.