In keeping with ARCOmadrid’s increasingly innovative structure, the 2018 edition of the fair will have as its central theme not a nation or region but rather a concept: The Future. With a special exhibition and events programme curated by guest curator Chus Martínez (along with co-curators Rosa Lleó and Elise Lammer), a radical new fair design by architect Andrés Jaque, and fueled by a newly vigorous Spanish economy and art market, ARCOmadrid will offer collectors, art world professionals and fair visitors a singular opportunity for an in-depth look not only at some of the most up-to-date art being created today, but also a framework to approach the art of tomorrow.

According to Martínez, the concept of The Future at ARCOmadrid 2018 “is not a speculative exercise into the future of the art market, but rather into the future of our actions and responsibilities in art and culture… Our idea is to create a space that will allow us to imagine, produce and propose a vision of the complexity that lies in wait for us.” In keeping with this approach, the title Martínez has chosen for the curated section of the fair is a quote from Jorge Luis Borges: “What is going to happen is not ‘the future’, but what we are going to do.”

What is going to happen is not “the future,” but what we are going to do, will take physical form at the fair through a selection of 20 artists and galleries carefully chosen by the curators, spanning various generations and geographic regions. The same concepts will be explored on a theoretical level through a series of presentations, lectures and panel discussions during a full-day interdisciplinary seminar of leading international curators, critics, philosophers and scientists.