Notes related to Contemporary art

Fragmenting Obsolescence. Silent Spring explores new ways of observing matter and time, objects and their durability, and the relationship between extinction and obsolescence.

By Álvaro de Benito

The Gulbenkian Modern Art Center in Lisbon presents Entre os vossos dentes (Between Your Teeth), an exhibition showcasing 80 works by Adriana Varejão (Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, 1964) and Paula Rego (Lisbon, Portugal, 1935 – London, United Kingdom, 2022), reflecting the production, themes, and interpretations of these two artists from different generations.

From different disciplines and territories, the invited artists propose the Biennial as a space of crossing, listening, and shared transformation.

Pinta Asunción Art Week, formerly known as Pinta Sud | ASU, will take place this year from September 10 to 13, marking its fourth edition. With its extensive contemporary art and cultural programming spread across the city, the event invites attendees to discover an ever-growing artistic scene alongside Paraguay’s unique cultural, culinary, and tourism traditions.

What does it mean to be hospitable, make alliances, or navigate conflict in the sphere of contemporary art? Five European nonprofit art spaces—La Escocesa, OFF-Biennale, < rotor >, Shtatëmbëdhjetë (17), and tranzit.cz—present a new publication for cultural workers, curators, and artists, that seeks to answer these questions.

The Andalusian Center of Contemporary Art (CAAC) presents Sensemayá. Cánticos para matar a la Culebra (Sensemaya. Chants to kill the snake), the first solo institutional exhibition in Spain by Claribel Calderius (Havana, Cuba, 1986). Conceived specifically for the San Bruno Chapel, the project is a site-specific intervention that draws on the space’s historical and spiritual resonance—qualities that align seamlessly with the symbolic universe of the Cuban artist.

Gonzalo García Callegari presents his twentieth solo exhibition at the Inca Garcilaso Cultural Center in Lima. In the wake of Peru’s bicentennial of independence, he invites us—with his signature dark humor—to question the unfinished ideals of national emancipation.

From June 6 to 8, 2025, the interdisciplinary festival Once We Were Trees, Now We Are Birds will take place at Kunsthaus ACUD in Berlin. Organized by the Goethe-Institut in Exile in cooperation with the Martin Roth-Initiative, the festival showcases artistic perspectives on migration, belonging, and transformation. It complements the exhibition of the same name, on view at the ifa Gallery Berlin until June  8, 2025.

Inspired by the visionary spirit of Walter and Nicole Leblanc, the Foundation launches a new programme of exhibitions, residencies, and events, reaffirming its commitment to artistic inquiry, international dialogue, and critical engagement with the urgencies of our time.

The artist and the gallerist were drinking mate on Fleming Avenue in Martínez, in front of the gallery, trying to hold onto the warmth of a cool autumn sun. That simple, everyday, and sincere image foreshadowed the exhibition at Departamento 112.

The first edition of Pinta Panamá Art Week was a collective celebration that transformed the city into a major stage for contemporary art and Central American culture. The event welcomed over 650 attendees at its official opening and thousands of visitors throughout the week, with daily activities including exhibition openings, talks, guided tours, and urban experiences. The week was marked by a strong commitment to strengthening and valuing local identity.

As part of Pinta Panamá Art Week, Lo que sueña toda vida takes place—an exhibition project that reflects on ways of living in the Central American country. Curated by Juan Canela and Emiliano Valdés, the program features a series of artistic actions by Felipe Gómez and Jonathan Harker, the Enlaces Program, Libertad Rojo, and Humberto Vélez.

The Casa de México Foundation in Spain is hosting, through the second week of June, a must-see exhibition from the Jumex Collection—one of the most significant contemporary art collections in Latin America. Titled Éramos felices y no lo sabíamos (We Were Happy and Didn't Know It), the exhibition revisits the vibrant artistic scene of 1990s Mexico, offering a re-reading of one of the most dynamic periods in the country’s contemporary art history.

Proa Foundation celebrates the reopening of its renovated spaces with an exhibition organized in collaboration with the Vitra Design Museum: Here We Are! Women in Design 1900–Today, a journey through 120 years of female creativity, innovation, and talent in design.

The group show Over Land and Sea, curated by Anna Nowak, tells of the migrant history of humanity, its present and future. In a tension between the tangible and the mythical, the animate and the industrial world, the works on display point to the vulnerability of human beings and, simultaneously, their inherent ability to change and transform.

The Spanish artist known for challenging socio-cultural conventions and exploring the power relations embedded in urban imagery and text presents the exhibition Muntadas Lugar Público in Brazil.

Through the idea of an endless spiral, this exhibition at the Museo Universitario de Arte Contemporáneo (MUAC) unfolds as a reverse retrospective of artist Magali Lara (Mexico City, 1956), beginning with two murals created especially for the show and tracing back to her earliest drawings from the 1980s and 1970s.

This Wednesday, painter and artist Luis Felipe Noé, known as "Yuyo," passed away at the age of 87, leaving behind a fundamental legacy in contemporary Argentine art. His work, which encompassed painting, drawing, sculpture, and installations, reflected his ongoing quest to represent the complexity of the modern world.

At the Lima Art Museum – MALI, the exhibition Yerko Zlatar. Ancestral Technology is currently on view. This show invites reflection on the contrast between the deep, harmonious connection that ancient Andean civilizations had with the cosmos and their environment, and the way we now live, governed by a technology driven by consumerism and individualism.

The Museum of Modern and Contemporary Art in Bolzano-Bozen presented a pioneering exhibition on the relationship between graffiti and contemporary art. Curated by Leonie Radine and Ned Vena, the show will be the first in an Italian museum to explore the history of spray paint in art. 

The Casa Nacional del Bicentenario has inaugurated Una Casa. La Casa. Lo doméstico deviene territorios (A House. The House. The Domestic Becomes Territories). This is the first public exhibition of works from the collection of Abel Guaglianone and Joaquín Rodríguez.

The Mexican art scene is going through an exceptional moment. There is a palpable energy, with new galleries opening, others already consolidated in the process of expansion and Mexican artists and curators gaining more and more international visibility. Their presence in museums, biennials and global fairs continues to grow, consolidating Mexico as a key player in the contemporary art scene.

Contemporary art has become a testing ground where the boundaries between disciplines dissolve, giving way to hybrid experiences. In this shifting landscape, artist Cristian Segura introduces an unexpected provocation: an ice cream that is not only tasted but also contemplated.

The Hochschild Correa Collection boasts of being the most complete private collection of contemporary art from the Peruvian Amazon. Nevertheless, for more than a decade, it has been built on a varied and unrestricted collection, which has made it possible to bring together the different trends and techniques currently being used in the region, with a focus on dialogue and a certain relational patina among the works that make up the collection. 

La Casa Encendida is planning a large part of its artistic, exhibition program this season around the concept of Verbos encendidos, a framework line of argument that frames the theme and the perspective from which certain public, political and social issues are approached from the institution. Escuchar (Listen) is the first verb, chosen to start with it a call for attention towards the construction of spaces and tools that allow to overcome differences and find common spaces of understanding.

The Miriam and Ira D. Wallach Art Gallery at Columbia University presents Rubén Ortiz-Torres: Zonas de Colaboración, the artist’s first major solo exhibition in New York, curated by Betti-Sue Hertz.

The Museo Universitario de Arte Contemporáneo (MUAC) presents the work of French artist Kader Attia: A Descent into Paradise.

The Venezuelan's work has been added to the permanent collection of the Guggenheim Museum in New York, marking a significant milestone in the artist’s career. Additive Spectrum was first shown in Beltrán’s UNDER THE SUN, OVER THE EARTH exhibition at CENTRAL FINE, showcasing a vibrant exploration of color and emotional resonance.

The Eiteljorg Museum of American Indians and Western Art will host one of the largest exhibitions of contemporary Native bead art ever presented in North America: Radical Stitch features approximately 100 works of bead art highlighting Native techniques and designs that tell stories and address current issues.

The Center for Art, Research and Alliances (CARA) spring 2025 exhibition, continents like seeds, brings together the work of La Chola Poblete (b. 1989, Argentina), Niño de Elche (b. 1985, Spain), and Pedro G. Romero (b. 1964, Spain); through sound, sculpture, performance, drawing, and painting, the show unravels and exposes the contradictions and ambiguities of colonial legacies.