Bringing Argentine Art to the World

Matching Funds: Bringing Argentine Art to the World

The acquisition program with contributions from private sponsors celebrates its 20th anniversary at the fair.

It played a vital role in the current presence of Argentine artists in the collections of important national and international museums.

This year, 2025, the Matching Funds program, a purchasing incentive for Argentine art, celebrates its 20th anniversary. It raises private funds with different sponsors in each edition to encourage purchases from institutions around the world, which must at least double the initial amount.

“Being in a museum's collection enables research, exhibitions, and circulation; it has a direct market effect, a multiplier effect,” explains Lucrecia Palacios. “And each of the funds applied to the program is multiplied by at least 10, because each museum arrives with its board that makes purchases for its private collections,” she adds.

In these virtuous two decades, a podium of Argentine women have emerged into the world thanks to this program, from Magdalena Jitrik to Fernanda Laguna, and from Marta Minujín to Elba Bairon, among many others.

Sharon Lerner, director of the Museo de Arte de Lima (MALI), Peru, will visit arteba again this year and is preparing an exhibition at the Museum with all the works acquired through this program.

In addition to Lerner, the arteba Professionals Program will feature visits from Patricia Hanna of El Espacio 23 - Jorge M. Pérez Collection in Miami, invited by the Ama Amoedo Foundation; Silvia Karman Cubiñá, executive director of The Bass Museum in the same city, among others.

The Program has the collaboration of the National Investment Agency. The Museums Program will bring to Buenos Aires Manuel Segade from the Reina Sofía Museum; Pablo León de la Barra from the Guggenheim Museum in New York; Claudia Segura, from the MACBA in Barcelona; and Jorge Rivas, Chief Curator of the St. Louis Art Museum in Missouri, United States, who is launching a collection of Latin American art. These are just some of the international exhibitors already confirmed, who will join national museums and institutions.

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