In every training process, artists learn from the masters; they copy the techniques, styles and works of their predecessors until they mature their own creative personality. This evolution necessarily involves imitating, repeating and interpreting the most representative pieces of art history as references. From there, the particular identity of the artist builds up, which is sometimes supported by previous works to offer an updated reading. This has happened with Duchamp, Modigliani, Damien Hirst, Goya, Bacon ... and Picasso himself.

Pablo Picasso, “Meninas”, 1957

Picasso used to say that "great artists copy, geniuses steal". This master of the 20th century also wanted to reinterpret some of the most iconic works of the history of painting and to do so he has sought inspiration in major European museums, such as the Prado or the Louvre. With his work, the author from Malaga adapted to the new times of modernism based on the classics.

Pablo Picasso, "Jacqueline con sombrero de paja", 1962

The Círculo de Bellas Artes hosts the exhibition "Picasso and the Museum" in which it explores this facet so little studied by the painter. Much has been written about the origin of Cubism and the imprint of Picasso in the universal history of painting, however, his work has not always been analysed from the perspective of his great influences.

Pablo Picasso, “Hombre con gorguera”, 1962

Since Picasso visited the Prado when he was 13 years old, the impact of these great works, which so much impressed him, can be traced in many of his compositions. Ingres, Manet, Velázquez, Courbet, Zurbarán, Delacroix, Rembrandt ... have left a mark, not always evident, in the author's imagination. Sometimes hidden among the angles of his cubic figures or hidden among the strokes of his sketches ... the inspiration has a lot of homage and imitation.

The exhibition is open until May 16th and completes with a program of guided tours and children's activities designed to understand better this unexplored aspect of Picasso’s work.

ABIERTO INFINITO. LO QUE EL CUERPO RECUERDA. PERFORMANCE CYCLE X ART MADRID'26

Art Madrid, committed to creating a discursive platform for artists working within the field of performance and action art, presents Abierto Infinito: lo que el cuerpo recuerda, a proposal inspired by Erving Goffman’s ideas in The Presentation of Self in Everyday Life (Amorrortu Editores, Buenos Aires, 1997).

The project unfolds within a theoretical framework that directly engages with these premises, conceiving social interaction as a stage of carefully modulated performances designed to influence others’ perceptions. Goffman argues that individuals deploy both verbal and involuntary expressions to guide the interpretation of their behavior, sustaining roles and façades that define the situation for those who observe.

The body — the first territory of all representation — precedes both word and learned gesture. Human experience, conscious and unconscious alike, is inscribed within it. Abierto Infinito: lo que el cuerpo recuerda departs from this premise: representation inhabits existence itself, and life, understood as a succession of representations, transforms the body into a space of constant negotiation over who we are. In this passage, boundaries blur; the individual opens toward the collective, and the ephemeral acquires symbolic dimension. By inhabiting this interstice, performance simultaneously reveals the fragility of identity and the strength that emerges from encounter with others.

PERFORMANCE: ALTA FACTURA. BY COLECTIVO LA BURRA NEGRA

March 4 | 7:00 PM. Galería de Cristal of the Palacio de Cibeles.

"Discipline for Power.” Performance by La Burra Negra for Displacement of the Congress of Deputies by Roger Bernat. 2025.

Alta Factura subverts the conventional structure of the fashion runway to foreground the often-invisible processes that underpin artistic production. Through a series of conceptual textile works, the performance draws attention to the discipline of craft and the artist’s vulnerability, ultimately revealing those seams typically consigned to the margins, behind the scenes.

Colectivo La Burra Negra.

ABOUT EL COLECTIVO LA BURRA NEGRA

La Burra Negra is a nomadic performance art collective based in Málaga, founded in 2024 following its first residency in Totalán. The group is self-managed by Ascensión Soto Fernández, Gabriela Feldman de la Rocha, Sasha Camila Falcke, Sara Gema Domínguez Castillo, Sofía Barco Sánchez, and Regina Lagos González—six artists from diverse backgrounds and trajectories who met at the Hospital de Artistas at La Juan Gallery.

The collective brings together practitioners working across jewelry, painting, the performing arts, music, dance, cultural mediation, and arts management. Its activities include an annual residency in Totalán, the production of performative works, cultural mediation initiatives, and site-responsive interventions.

Since its inception, the collective has participated in the Periscopio series at La Térmica; presented A granel at the MVA in Málaga; carried out a number of actions in Totalán—the most recent during its second annual residency—and contributed its own proposals to the performance Displacement of the Congress of Deputies by Roger Bernat in Madrid.

At the core of La Burra Negra lies a commitment to collective creation and the exchange of knowledge. United in their effort to experiment with and disseminate performance art, the group explores the invisible dimensions of artistic labor—its temporalities, efforts, and relational dynamics, which so often remain unseen—as a form of critical affirmation.

Their practice emerges from dialogue and shared reflection, in the pursuit of decentralized spaces where art can be experienced and its processes made visible. Each residency and each action becomes an attempt to inhabit creation collectively, challenging conditions of precarity while fostering networks of care and collaboration that sustain both their own practice and that of those around them.