ARCO MADRID 2026 | MADRID, 03.04.26 – 03.08.26

In a world facing unprecedented ecological collapse, art must not only reflect — it must activate. This project brings together four visionary artists whose practices, though distinct, converge in a shared commitment to artistic activism. Each work on view constitutes a call to rethink our entanglement with the Earth, advocating for new forms of perception, responsibility, and planetary care.

Peter Fend transforms cartography into resistance. With Global Desert, he appropriates the visual codes of energy corporations to unveil the devastating realities of fossil fuel dependency. His maps and proposals are not metaphors, but real strategies — ecological blueprints that redraw territory along hydrological and biopolitical lines. His work exposes the contradictions of extractive capitalism while offering actionable alternatives grounded in planetary ethics.

Tomás Saraceno invites us into radical cohabitation with nonhuman worlds. His collaborative works with spiders — intricate web sculptures — and his iridescent, air-borne and foam-based installations propose a shift in consciousness. They ask: what would it mean to inhabit the air, the web, the void — not as dominators, but as guests? Saraceno’s practice merges science, architecture, and imagination, constructing utopias of interspecies solidarity and post-fossil futures.

Koo Jeong A’s SS(Seven Stars) series traces a lyrical, metaphysical path through ecology, astronomy, and perception. Her works imagine a reality in which trees, stars, and viewers are bound by invisible lines of light, time, and mutual care. Engaging with the forgotten dimension of night — now obscured by light pollution — her glowing canvases restore the dark as a space of vision and reflection. Her practice, deeply anti-speciesist, recovers the intelligence of plants and the silent wisdom of planetary rhythms.

Mark Dion turns his attention to the fragile ecosystems of marine life. Known for his practice of assembling pseudo-scientific displays that mimic the aesthetics of natural history museums, Dion draws viewers into an inquiry that is both ecological and political. By cataloguing species, artifacts, and remnants of human impact, he highlights what is at stake in our oceans: not only the loss of biodiversity, but the erosion of cultural and environmental memory. Through this work, Dion underscores how
coastal and underwater environments are frontline witnesses of the climate crisis, reminding us that preservation is not nostalgia, but resistance: a commitment to defending the plurality of life forms against the homogenizing forces of extraction and urbanization.

Together, these four artists articulate a politics of ecological urgency — one that rejects spectacle and embraces knowledge, care, and intervention. This is not an exhibition of environmental themes; it is a constellation of artworks-as-agents, tracing new imaginaries of coexistence, resistance, and transformation.