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Exhibitions

2025 at MACBA: art and resistance to rewrite history

New perspectives to question official narratives and rethink the past.

‘Nefandus’, Carlos Motta (2013). Col·lecció MACBA
2025 at MACBA: art and resistance to rewrite history
bonart barcelona - 21/01/25

MACBA's exhibition proposal for 2025 is an invitation to rethink our present from the historical shadows that have been hidden and silenced. This year, the museum celebrates its 30th anniversary, an important event that will coincide with the presentation of three major exhibitions that question official narratives and offer new perspectives on decolonial and activism issues. The set of exhibitions will combine art, history and politics with a clear desire to confront and debate the realities and narratives made invisible by dominant institutions. In a global context marked by the rise of populist and reactionary movements, MACBA wants to act as a race against time for critical reflection, offering present and future generations an expansive, inclusive and decolonial vision of contemporary art.

2025 at MACBA: art and resistance to rewrite history 'Dunham', Simon Leigh (2017). The Art Institute of Chicago. © 2017 Simone Leigh. Jonathan Mathias

The most prominent exhibition will be 'Projecting a Black Planet. The Art and Culture of Pan-Africa', in November, which will address Pan-Africanism from its origins in the 1920s to the present day through 350 pieces by artists from 80 countries. This is the first time that a large-scale exhibition has been held on the cultural and political relevance of Pan-Africanism on a global scale. With the collaboration of leading institutions such as the Art Institute of Chicago and the Barbican Centre in London and curated by Anatawan Byrd , Elvira Dyangani Ose , Adom Getachew and Matthew S. Witkovsky , the exhibition is analyzed from various geographical and temporal perspectives, and includes a look at the impact of Pan-Africanism in Catalonia and the Spanish State. MACBA proposes a structured itinerary around concepts that expand on key notions such as the foundations of Pan-Africanism, studies of blackness —both as an aesthetic movement and as a unifying element of the black essence—, representation, the relevance of religious and animist beliefs, as well as forms of public protest and anti-racist and civil rights movements.

2025 at MACBA: art and resistance to rewrite history ‘Untitled self-portrait’, Carlos Motta (1998). Cortesia Mor Charpentier, Paris

Activism and a decolonial perspective will also mark the exhibitions of Carlos Motta (Bogotá, 1978) and Coco Fusco (New York, 1960). 'Carlos Motta. Prayers of Resistance', in February, will be a retrospective of the Colombian artist curated by Agustín Pérez-Rubio and María Berríos . Motta, in more than twenty-five years of career, has covered themes as diverse as migration, political violence, civil rights, HIV/AIDS and queer struggles in Latin America and the Caribbean. His work pivots on two axes that dialogue and multiply the implications of being dissident: intersectionality and the queer element. Motta challenges official narratives and gives voice to those who have been historically silenced, proposing a radical reflection on social justice, dictatorships and colonialism, using politics, the body and performance in a committed and provocative way. Furthermore, his work also attacks the imposition of Eurocentric epistemologies, from the conquest and colonial period in America to its propagation in the present, with a special emphasis on the legacy of religion as a perpetrating and disruptive vehicle of coloniality.

2025 at MACBA: art and resistance to rewrite history ‘Paquita y chata se arrebatan’, Coco Fusco (1996). Col·lecció Mendes Wood Dm

Similarly, Cuban artist Coco Fusco will offer a critical look at the processes of cultural, economic and political colonization starting in May. Her exhibition 'I learned to swim dry', curated by Elvira Dyangani Ose , takes its title from the first sentence of the poetic micro-story Swimming, written by Cuban Virgílio Piñera in 1957. The central core of the exhibition is the word, the symbolic use of silence and the inversion of language in a historical - and present - confrontation between artistic expression and power. Fusco has been one of the most influential voices in denouncing colonialism and her work proposes alternatives for the construction of a more just and equitable future, in which the struggles for the rights of indigenous and Afro-descendant peoples are protagonists. Her profound criticism of the global system, from the perspective of a Cuban counterculture, provides an essential insight into understanding the processes that have marked the evolution of modern society.

As part of the celebration of its 30th anniversary, MACBA will present the exhibition '30th Anniversary Collection' in the autumn, a journey that pays tribute to its trajectory and the artists who have contributed to its identity. The show will explore the intersections between gender, race and nationality, as well as artistic practices that question traditional notions of humanity and nature. Through a dialogue between various creative expressions, concepts of subjectivity and identity will be addressed from a relational and performative perspective. Artists such as Joan Ponç , Jean-Michel Basquiat , El Palomar , Ocaña , Esther Ferrer , Dias & Riegwig , Zush , William Kentridge , Eulàlia Valldosera , Rineke Dijkstra , Helio Oiticica , Josefa Tolrà , Àngels Ribé , Tacita Dean and Onofre Batxiller , among others, will be part of this exhibition.

2025 at MACBA: art and resistance to rewrite history ‘Love’s sweeter than wine. Tres estadis en una relació. Sèrie aparences #3’, Eulàlia Valldosera (1993). Col·lecció MACBA. © Eulàlia Valldosera, VEGAP, Barcelona

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