Art
The Art section of the exhibition contains what are considered to be the 44 most significant pieces of the Artium Collection. In reality, the selection of these “significant” works would vary in accordance with the criteria used by the curator of the exhibition; in this case, Daniel Castillejo has used a criterion based on an indicator measurable in objective terms: these are the artworks requested on more occasions by other museums for exhibition on loan and the works that have formed part of shows more frequently both at Artium and other centres.

On this occasion, the aim of the exhibition is not, as may have been the case on other occasions, to demonstrate how art and artists have approached a subject matter of more or less contemporary interest, but to try to offer the public an unparalleled, fundamentally aesthetic experience. In this way, the South Gallery of Artium brings together the works of well-known artists from different moments in the history of the 20th and 21st centuries, such as Pablo Picasso, Joan Miró, Salvador Dalí, Óscar Domínguez, Manuel Millares, Antoni Tápies, José Guerrero, Eduardo Chillida, Jorge Oteiza, Equipo Crónica, Joan Brossa, Darío Villalba, Luis Gordillo, Vicente Ameztoy, Antonio Saura, Miquel Barceló, Cristina Iglesias, Rogelio López Cuenca... There are works by artists who are playing a prominent role on the 21st century art scene, for example, by Simeón Sáiz Ruiz, Fernando Sánchez Castillo, Cristina Lucas and El Perro.

Each of the works on show is accompanied by a text written for the exhibition by some of the most prestigious writers on art at this time, including among others, Fernando Castro Flórez, José Lebrero, Rosa Olivares, Estrella de Diego, Aimar Arriola, Carles Guerra, Gloria Picazo, Imma Prieto, Ismael Manterola, Francisco Javier San Martín, Laura Fernández Orgaz, Sara Gonzalez de Aspuru and Javier González de Durana.

Art system
On the other hand, the second section of the exhibition seeks to respond to many questions that an inexpert spectator might formulate about the how and why, among other questions, of a collection such as that of the Artium Museum, and based on that, figure out how the so-called “art system” works. This concept is not easy to define or get a grip of but it might be said that, apart from the artist and the work, it consists of a set of processes, people, entities and institutions that intervene so that a work of art can be considered as such and be given the respect it deserves.

The exhibition seeks to clarify matters such as the origins of the Artium Collection; explain the procedures followed once the work of art enters the Museum; reveal significant examples of the work of curators and restorers; highlight the importance of the precise work of registration and classification; reveal the difficulties that lie in mounting just one piece of work, let alone an entire exhibition; show on a world map the routes followed by the works of the Collection throughout the world; or tackle the thorny question of the economic value of a work of art, among other issues.