from fairgrounds to fishing huts: CAN ibiza 2025 maps contemporary art across the island

CAN – Contemporary Art Now completes fourth edition in Ibiza

Long known for its pulsating rhythms and azure waters, Ibiza has in recent years offered a different kind of immersion: CAN – Contemporary Art Now. From June 25th to 29th, 2025, the island hosted the fair’s fourth edition, where contemporary art met the Mediterranean’s slower pace. Curated by Saša Bogojev and held at the FECOEV fairgrounds just beyond the old town walls, CAN Ibiza 2025 brought together a tightly edited selection of international and Balearic galleries, spanning painting, sculpture, textiles, and installation.

Organized by the team behind Madrid’s UVNT art fair, CAN has carved out its own space in the global art calendar. More contained than the larger fairs that dominate the scene, it lends itself to slower looking and closer conversation, a tone that quietly set the rhythm throughout. But CAN doesn’t stop at the fairgrounds. Visitors are invited to explore the island itself, where site-specific works appear in unexpected settings: a restored fishing hut, a disused water irrigation system, and other reimagined spaces that echo Ibiza’s evolving cultural landscape.

all images by Maria Santos, unless stated otherwise

A Curated Canvas: From Painting to Public Art

This year’s edition of CAN – Contemporary Art Now continued its focus on painting, offering a broad spectrum of styles from sharp-edged realism to loose figuration and abstract gestures. While painting remained central, the fair subtly expanded its scope, introducing works in textiles, ceramics, sculpture, and installation. These material explorations brought added depth and tactility, reflecting a growing interest in process, texture, and form. Across the booths, themes of nature, harmony, and the human figure emerged as quiet undercurrents.

In the meantime, a new addition for 2025, the CAN Design section introduced a curated selection of collectible design galleries from Ibiza and beyond. Bridging fine art and functional aesthetics, this chapter gently widened the fair’s lens, reinforcing its connection to the island’s creative ecosystem.

this year’s edition of CAN – Contemporary Art Now continued its focus on painting | image © Sayana Cairo

Beyond the Booths

CAN’s presence extended well beyond the fairgrounds, weaving into the island’s cultural fabric through its OFF Program and CAN Local initiatives. Now in its third year, the OFF Program transformed historic sites into exhibition spaces: a lighthouse in Sant Antoni hosted paintings by Alba Suau and Adrià Mayordomo; Joan Canyelles exhibited at the Santa Eulària des Riu air raid shelter; and Andrián Martínez showed work at Sa Punta des Molí, a restored mill. These off-site activations offered a slower, place-specific way to encounter art, grounded in the textures of the island itself.

Running alongside, CAN Local presented a parallel program of exhibitions organized by local galleries and institutions as part of the expanding Ibiza Art Week. At La Nave Salinas, Spencer Lewis and Pedro Pedro were featured in a two-person show, MACE (Museu d’Art Contemporani d’Eivissa) hosted works by Miquel Barceló and Ramon Enrich, and Estudi Tur Costa paired paintings by Erwin Bechtold with sculpture by Franco Monti. Site-specific projects added another layer: Edith Dekyndt transformed CAN Garita, a former fishing hut, with a multimedia installation referencing the island’s ecological shifts; while Lena M. Emrich’s sculptural work occupied SAFA, a disused water irrigation system. Together, these projects traced new intersections between contemporary practice and Ibiza’s evolving cultural landscape.

As Sergio Sancho, Founding Director of CAN Ibiza, shared, the fair aims to present ‘the very best of the avant-garde visual arts scene,’ seeking to ‘mix culture, business and enjoyment.’ This approach, coupled with Saša Bogojev’s curatorial vision, which prioritizes a tight selection of galleries and fosters a more ‘relaxed’ atmosphere, appears to be shaping CAN into an experience where meaningful connections — both artistic and personal — can flourish.

the fair also introduced works in textiles, ceramics, sculpture, and installation | image © Sayana Cairo