The initiative, organized by the Iberoamerica Diseña Association, the Madrid City Council, and the Foro por Madrid, aims to "showcase the value of graphics for visual communication, culture, and the economy in our society." The exhibition, celebrating its eighth anniversary, features the Faculty of Fine Arts as one of its satellite venues.
Among the fifty exhibited works, one belongs to Jaime Prada, a fourth-year Design degree student. Margarita González, Vice-Dean of Culture, Communication, and Heritage, highlights that Madrid Gráfica Abierta "seeks to make visible the importance of design and how design serves to reformulate social issues, presenting a different theme each year, which in this case has been to imagine each person's city, from very different perspectives."
Manuel Estrada, one of the event's organizers, explained that the theme "Imagine Your City" was chosen to allow each participant to envision their desired urban space, diverging from the initial idea of focusing solely on Madrid. Professor Elo García encourages students to participate, calling the initiative a "great opportunity" to showcase their work.
Jaime Prada describes his poster, featuring a bear on a strawberry tree looking frightened, as a reflection on contemporary Madrid and the impact of tourism. "The intention was to focus on Madrid's current state, with the increase in tourists that seems to invade the streets, using the well-known icon of the bear and the strawberry tree to show how the animal is scared of all these people it doesn't know and who are not the real Madrileños," he explains.
Madrid Gráfica Abierta also includes other activities, such as exhibitions of Latin graphic design for album covers at the Real Conservatorio Superior de Música, works by ten Ibero-American graphic designers at the Colegio de Arquitectos de Madrid, and "one hundred words" at the Casa del Lector in Matadero. The fourth Ibero-American Forum for Research and Design will also be held.
