Art Madrid'26 – THE INTERACTIVE ILLUSTRATION OF ANA JUAN

 

Drawing of Ana Juan


Ana Juan, Valencia 1961. She studied BBAA. In his native city, at the beginning of the XXI century it gave the international leap appearing even in the cover of the New Yorker. Also, in these same dates begins to experiment with the infantile literature, sort that continues practicing until our days. Already in 2010, she was awarded the National Enlightenment Award, consecrated as one of the most influential illustrators of our era. Now, the ABC Museum of Madrid dedicates this pioneering exhibition that breaks the exhibition limits.

 

View of the exhibition

 

 

Figures and chiaroscuro predominate in this graphic adventure, where the lights and the shadows are represented with rigorous strokes of coal pencil. This graphic-interactive challenge has been possible thanks to the collaboration with Unit Experimental (collaboration group between the Faculty of BBAA and the Higher Technical School of Informatics Engineering of the Polytechnic University of València). The result of this union, is the most futuristic individual exhibition to date in the capital.

 

View of the exhibition

 

 

The reinterpretation of their illustrations through an app makes them come to life. A new resource that can be downloaded on our smartphones and browse the different points of the room. They are operative for both Android and Iphone. And not only offers this technological immersion, but the exhibition offers other activities such as the guided tour of the exhibition with the artist, on 17 and 19 May at 18:30 (for this activity requires prior registration at the reception of the Museum).

 

 

Drawing of Ana Juan

 

 

The staging of two of his best-known books, such as, Another Turn of the Nut by Henry James and Snowhite's version of Snow White make it possible for the viewer to contemplate both the original canvases that served to illustrate the books, how to be part of the game Created from his illustrated story. The room is the scene of the game and its spectators the protagonists who will undoubtedly get a good impression of these drawings.

 


ABIERTO INFINITO. LO QUE EL CUERPO RECUERDA. CICLO DE PERFORMANCE 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: OSCURECER UN PAPEL. BY ROCÍO VALDIVIESO

March 5 | 7:00 PM. Galería de Cristal of the Palacio de Cibeles.


Nocturnality. Installation. Rocío Valdivieso..


Oscurecer un papel forms part of a series of actions in which the artist engages in reading through repetition, memorization, and a measured degree of improvisation. Within this framework, a non-linear mode of reading emerges from a written text that is transformed when spoken aloud, assuming a different form in the act of articulation. The texts stem from an ongoing investigation into materiality, space, the relationships between body and matter, writing, the sculptural, and a sustained interest in the exploration of voice and orality.

The material from which Oscurecer un papel is constructed consists of a collection of purchase receipts the artist has been accumulating over time. The printed text they contain, together with the action of bringing them into proximity with a heat source—thereby activating the thermal paper on which they are produced—generates meanings that revolve around the notions of consumption and wear.


Rocío Valdivieso. Latent Aura. Performance documentation.


ABOUT ROCÍO VALDIVIESO

Rocío Valdivieso is an artist, researcher, and cultural manager. She is currently a PhD candidate in Fine Arts at the Complutense University of Madrid. She holds an MA in Research in Artistic Practices from the University of Castilla–La Mancha (UCLM) and a BA in Fine Arts from the National University of Tucumán, Argentina. She was a Fundación Carolina fellow from 2022 to 2023. She currently co-directs Errática. Laboratory of Processes and Critique in Madrid, alongside Romina Casile.

She was part of the PEEPA 2023 Program at the Centro de Residencias Artísticas, Matadero Madrid. She completed the 2021/22 Artists Program at Universidad Torcuato Di Tella, Buenos Aires, and in 2020 participated in the Intensive Curatorial Program of Proyecto PAC at Galería Gachi Prieto, Buenos Aires. She received the Visual Arts Promotion Award at the 4th Visual Arts Week of the Ente Cultural de Tucumán. She was awarded an AUGM scholarship for an exchange residency at UNESP, São Paulo, Brazil. She also participated in the International Residency Program La Ira de Dios and in the Acéfala Galería Residency for Argentine artists.