COLLECTION AWARDS 2026

ThePreussCollection is ultra-contemporary at its best, comprising more than 400 artworks. It includes not only major names such as Damien Hirst, David Hockney and Joseph Beuys, but also artworks that support young artists from all over the world, as well as works by Spanish artists such as Ana Barriga, Juan de la Rica, Andrés Lozano, Adriana Oliver and Daniel Núñez, among others. 

For several years, they have also been curating their own exhibitions with works from the collection and presenting them to the public for several weeks. In 2023, they presented the exhibition CONTEMPORARY HOUSE in Berlin, featuring works from 2020 onwards. In 2024, they presented THE FIRST, THE LAST AND THE BEAUTIES in Stuttgart, featuring 67 works from 1967 to 2024. In 2025, they presented SMALL IS GREAT in Stuttgart, featuring 70 works smaller than the Mona Lisa. A collection exhibition is also planned for the summer of 2026.

In addition, they have been running an artist residency in Berlin-Mitte for several years. In 2026, they will open their second residency, this time in Stuttgart, featuring a fully equipped Tiny House designed by British artist Richard Woods.

Their own gallery, BETTER GO SOUTH, has a clear focus on 21st-century art. Since 2022, it has provided a platform for talented artists and art students through their first exhibitions, as well as showcasing international emerging and established artists for the first time in Germany. This is usually combined with a residency with ThePreussCollection and concludes with a solo exhibition in Berlin or Stuttgart. This has resulted in more than 30 exhibitions featuring over 100 artists and the successful placement of hundreds of works with art lovers and internationally relevant collections.

The artist residency program at Collegium began in 2022 with the aim of offering artists adequate time and context to research, produce, and experiment. Through stays in Arévalo ranging from two weeks to two months, artists develop new projects connected to the surrounding environment, and their working process is documented in a video.

The residencies run in parallel with the exhibition program at the Church of San Martín and place a strong emphasis on exchange with the local context. Living together and engaging with people from the area form an integral part of the process, fostering mutual learning between artists and the community. The program is currently carried out in collaboration with other institutions and seeks to strengthen the relationship between contemporary creation and territory.

Artists who have taken part in residencies at Collegium include Ayla Tavares, Laura Mema, Ignacio Barrios, Mariela Scafati, and Ulises Mazzucca.

Casa MER, with its main storage facilities in Segovia (a city located 30 minutes by train from Madrid, Spain), is the result of the collecting passion of Elena Rueda and Marcos Martín Blanco, together with their son Rafael Martín, the trio from which the collection’s acronym is derived.

Founded in the 1980s, it has matured into one of the most important international private art collections in Spain and Europe. Their sustained effort to “educate the eye” and their curiosity to study and engage with contemporary art have led Casa MER to bring together nearly 800 works by both national and international artists, including Luis Gordillo, Carlos León, Eric Fischl, Lisa Yuskavage, Jenny Saville, Norbert Bisky, Marilyn Minter, Chloe Wise, Bill Viola, Willehad Eilers, Imon Boy and Miquel Barceló, among many others.

Candela Soldevilla is the creator of the Studiolo Collection, a project that was born almost by chance when, at a very young age, she acquired her first artwork in a modest gallery on Paris’s Rive Gauche. From the beginning, she showed a deep interest in the avant-gardes of the 20th century, although today her focus is on contemporary art, with a special emphasis on emerging artists.

The collection is housed in a unique space in Madrid known as Studiolo, a name inspired by the private rooms of Italian Renaissance residences from the 15th and 16th centuries. Originally, these studioli were spaces reserved for safeguarding artworks, manuscripts, and singular objects, also serving as refuges for contemplation, knowledge, and personal enjoyment.

Following this spirit, Candela Soldevilla’s Studiolo not only preserves her collection but also acts as a meeting and dialogue point for artists, collectors, and professionals in the cultural sphere, fostering exchange and inspiration.

Today, the Studiolo Collection brings together a selection of more than 350 works by national and international contemporary artists, among whom stand out names such as Pablo Picasso, Rafael Canogar, Juana Francés, Miquel Barceló, Anish Kapoor, and Man Ray. It also collaborates through loans and joint projects with public and private institutions such as the Lázaro Galdiano Foundation, the Royal Academy of Spain in Rome, and the Santander, DKV, and ABC Foundations, as well as the Art Centre of Alcobendas.

The Kells Collection was established in 1996 as a result of Juan Manuel Elizalde and Choli Fuentes’s engagement with the world of art. At that time, their interest focused on artists and works of modern art, mainly in the fields of painting and sculpture from the second half of the 20th century: Feito, Saura, Clavé, Sempere, Genovés, Baltasar Lobo, among others.

In 2004, the Kells Collection shifted its attention toward contemporary works and creative processes, including those of an object-based nature, with the acquisition of its first contemporary artwork.

Since then, the Kells Collection has been immersed in a continuous process of growth through the incorporation of new languages, such as photography—toward which they feel a particular passion—as well as video, video installation, installation, archives, and objects, which have been added as forms of expression. Conceptually, Juan Manuel and Choli understand collecting as an intense journey of learning and emotion.

Currently, the Collection comprises several hundred works, structured around an eclectic character that reflects their interests and the themes for which they feel particular affection and sensitivity. Language and communication, in their various forms, occupy a central place within the Collection.

Born in 1990, Piramidón is a hybrid space between a creative factory and an art gallery. It merges the field of artistic creation with the distribution, exhibition and sale of the pieces.
The unique design, consisting of eighteen studios and a gallery, allows the visitor to get to know the artists and their work in their own artistic environment.

LEA - Lab of Experimental Art - is a space and community that promotes emerging and mid-career artists, as well as the various agents that make up the cultural fabric of contemporary visual arts, with a series of programs that include residencies, stays, exhibitions, courses, and activities, all focused on generating collaborations between artists, curators, galleries, and institutions, both nationally and internationally. The LEA Residency Award for artists at the CAN Art Fair Madrid 2026 consists of a one-month free residency at LEA, with accommodation included, for an artist who is not a resident of Madrid; or a six-month free stay at LEA for an artist who is a resident of Madrid. In both cases, the artist will enjoy all the benefits that LEA provides to its artists: personalized mentoring, permanent membership of the LEA community, access to LEA contests for exhibitions in national and international galleries, inclusion in the annual LEA catalog, and appearance and promotion on the LEA website and social media. This prize must be enjoyed in 2026 and will culminate in a visit by professionals organized by the fair to observe the artist's creative process during their residency or prize stay. 

Mardel is a non-profit project whose aim is to promote contemporary art as a form of commitment from the private sector. Aware of the difficulties involved in forging new artistic trajectories, this award seeks to provide support and opportunities for contemporary artists.