Roberta Marrero in Madrid: an autumn encounter with queer art
When I plan a queer city break, I want to leave room for the places that ask something of me in daylight. This autumn, Madrid’s Museo del Romanticismo has given me a reason to make that space.
Roberta Marrero: Yo soy la navaja y la herida is announced for 30 October 2026 to 31 January 2027, with free admission to the temporary exhibition. Shangay reported the exhibition, and the museum’s own programme confirms its dates and admission terms.
Marrero, who lived from 1972 to 2024, was a Canarian visual artist, writer, poet and multidisciplinary creator. The museum describes a practice bringing together pop culture, collage, literature and autobiography, with her experience as a trans woman informing an exploration of identity, desire and exclusion.
The exhibition connects her work with Romanticism: the self, its contradictions, its wounds and its refusal to fit neatly inside the expectations of others. I find that an inviting starting point for looking beyond the familiar celebrity images that often dominate queer culture coverage.
I hope to visit. For now, this is an exhibition preview, and my interest is in the questions her work opens: who gets remembered, whose beauty becomes visible, and how an artist turns a personal vocabulary into something others can recognise.
If Madrid is on your calendar, check the museum’s opening hours and access information when planning your visit.