ARCOmadrid 2026 Signals a Turn Toward Tradition, and a New Generation of Collectors
At ARCOmadrid 2026, the most contemporary note is arriving through unexpectedly old channels. As the fair opened in Madrid, co-director Maribel López pointed to a pattern she has watched sharpen in recent years: artists are returning to traditional techniques and even “traditional technologies,” using the past less as nostalgia than as a working toolkit for the present.
“Over the past few years, one thing has become evident: many artists are looking back to traditional techniques—or even traditional technologies. Instead of rushing toward the future, they are reconnecting with the past and drawing from it to produce something that feels distinctly contemporary,” López said.
That recalibration is unfolding alongside a shift in who is buying. López said ARCO has been seeing “strong interest from a younger generation,” a development the fair is actively cultivating through a partnership with MACBA Studio, a patron initiative at the Museu d’Art Contemporani de Barcelona for supporters under 35. “The hope is that all of them will eventually become collectors—though about half of them may already be collecting,” she added.
For López, however, the deeper measure of ARCO’s health is visible in the fair’s internal ecosystem: how galleries mature within it. “After two or three years we see how they move from the Opening sector to the General Program sector and that for me is part of the success,” she said.
That pipeline begins in Opening, ARCO’s platform for younger galleries, which this year includes 19 exhibitors that have been operating for eight years or fewer. The section is curated by Rafa Barber, Anissa Touati, and Cristina Anglada, and it has become a bellwether for how quickly new spaces can build international relationships.
Among the participants is Method Gallery, which operates in Mumbai and New Delhi and is using Madrid to strengthen its European visibility while foregrounding artists from India and Pakistan. Founder Sahil Arora described the fair as a strategic reunion point after meeting Portuguese and Latin American collectors at ARCO Lisbon last year. “We met Portuguese and Latin American collectors at Arco Lisbon last year. We thought it would be a good idea to come to Madrid to reconnect with them,” he said.
In Method’s booth, a sculpture by Indian artist Sajid Wajid takes the form of a hammer whose head is shaped like a small house — a compact, unsettling metaphor for what Arora described as “bulldozer justice.” The term refers to a controversial practice in parts of India in which authorities demolish homes and properties, often affecting minority communities, allegedly as punishment following accusations of unrest or criminal activity and frequently without due judicial process.
Elsewhere on the floor, sales and conversations underscored ARCO’s long-standing role as a bridge between Spain and Latin America. One of the fair’s signature programs, “Profiles | Latin American Art,” continues for its 15th year, with this edition curated by José Esparza Chong Cuy. The section brings together 11 projects by Latin American artists and galleries, and López framed its longevity as a commitment to relationships built over time rather than a chase for novelty. “There is still so much to discover,” she said. “It would be easy to look somewhere else, but the relationships with [galleries] across Latin America have been built over more than a decade. I’m not one to rush on to the next big thing—I think what we are doing here is very special.”
Galleries reported that collectors from Latin America were not only present but engaged. Mor Charpentier, a French gallery with an outpost in Bogotá, presented a group selection of artists with ties to the region, including Mexican artist Teresa Margolles (b. 1963), Colombian artist Carlos Motta (b. 1978), Chilean photographer Paz Errázuriz (b. 1944), Guatemalan American artist Guadalupe Maravilla (b. 1976), and Colombian artist Daniel Otero Torres (b. 1985). The gallery sold about 15 works across categories, priced from €10,000–€60,000 (approximately $11,600–$70,000).
Director Arthur Gruson described Madrid as central to the gallery’s network of Spanish and Latin American patrons, and suggested the fair’s atmosphere supports risk. “We have loyal Spanish and Latin American collectors who come here. Many have made the trip to see us. Madrid is a key hub for us,” he said. “It seems that here we can afford to show edgier, more experimental works than at other fairs, perhaps because the financial stakes are lower.”
That sense of permission — to test, to show work that is less easily categorized — was echoed by Piera Ravnikar, whose Ljubljana-based gallery presented Nevena Aleksovski and Maja Babič Košir’s installation “Letters from the South: Milena.” For Ravnikar, ARCO’s particular strength lies in its openness to emerging positions and less codified practices.
If ARCOmadrid 2026 has a through line, it is the idea that the new is not always synonymous with the futuristic. In Madrid, tradition is being retooled, younger patrons are being courted with intention, and galleries are using the fair not just to sell, but to build the kind of continuity that can outlast a single edition.
