Arco 2015: new horizons

Arco 2015 closes its doors with a positive, hopeful balance sheet. It seems the recovery is here to stay and, although this 34th edition still shows the scars of the economic crisis, the numbers are starting to add up for the sector.

This year, the Madrid fair throws itself into art coming out of Latin America. The presence of Colombia as guest country reflects the way the sector is looking towards the American continent and the immediate future it sees there.

As for what was on show at Arco, this time round artists have gone for risk and surprise in their creations. Painting, as usual, is the dominant medium at the fair. Historic names turn up, among them Picasso, Miró and Basquiat. And it's a Jean-Michel that carries one of the highest price tags: two and a half million euros.

Photography, on the other hand, has been thinner on the ground than usual. In that discipline, the standout is the mural put together by Spaniard Daniel Andújar, in which he draws a very close connection between the Internet, capitalism and the world of drugs. What has had a bigger presence at Arco 2015 is video and sculpture.

A magnificent example of the latter is the monumental artwork by German artist Katharina Grosse, two bodies, one of aluminium and one a tree trunk, converging in a burst of colour. Also surprising is the unsettling sculpture of a doll surrounded by and tied to bones, which captures the intention of its author, the American Jimmie Durham, to go against the established order and break with linear language. Or the set that Spaniard Enrique Marty builds for his naked human figures in threatening poses. Along the same groundbreaking lines, the work of Colombian Jorge Magyaroff stands out, moving between accident and incident, turning his brushes and paint cans into artistic matter.

More human figures, this time in LED. They're the colourful pieces of people simply walking along and talking on their mobiles by Englishman Julian Opie. This is one of the many signs of digital art we find at Arco, proof that it's in fashion.

Back to Latin American art to point out the production of artists who are becoming regulars, such as Brazilian Ernesto Neto, who shows his impressive woven hanging structures. Or the always suggestive optical results of Venezuelan Carlos Cruz-Diez.

The racier note can be found in the fine hand-made embroideries of Colombian María Alejandra Garzón, known as Suntuosa Vulgaridad, with which she lays claim, no holds barred, to the sexual universe of women. Or perhaps in the artwork of Spaniard Pilar Albarracín, who composes a kind of mandala out of fifty pairs of red knickers.