NODO 2025 began with a collective visual map and announced its national expansion.

An exhibition born from trips, workshop encounters, backroom conversations, and coffee breaks that strengthen the bond between Meridiano—the Argentine Chamber of Contemporary Art Galleries—curator Lara Marmor , and nine galleries from Salta, Córdoba, Colonia Caroya, Rosario, Rafaela, and the Province of Buenos Aires. The exhibition, "Los encuentros impredecibles," on the ground floor of the Torre Macro, inaugurated the launch of the fourth edition of NODO Gallery Circuit , the chamber's flagship event, which has consolidated its position as a federal event.

"We are very happy to see how this project grows and strengthens, but NODO must still be greater, directing the vision and mission of our chamber, strengthening the federal ecosystem of contemporary art," said Diego Obligado , president of Meridiano, in the auditorium, along with María Casado, representing the entire board of directors.

And immediately afterward, he announced the holding of a National NODO edition , "a strategic tool to consolidate the different scenes and the role of galleries as a key agent in articulating effective dialogues between public and private entities."

This national dimension of NODO is evident in the exhibition surrounding the opening cocktail party. Unpredictable Encounters presents the work of 22 artists from diverse parts of our country , inviting us to broaden our perspective on our present and extend ties with contemporary artistic practices beyond the central centers.

Each of the works was carried out between 2020 and 2025 , a tiny period of time in relation to our extensive history, but during which so many things happened that even the tectonic layers of the Earth trembled.

Two words resonate throughout the exhibition: time and change . What do they mean in this context, and how do we confront them? In Marmor's view, these concepts are related to the novels of Afrofuturist author Octavia Butler , who "recognizes that we need change to continue living in this world that is broken and requires new epistemes and beliefs so that we can continue living in it without falling into the anguish of dystopia and everything that surrounds the feeling of end: the End of the world as we knew it," she explains.

At the same time, he emphasizes that this theme, far from trends, has permeated his curatorial work for several years and that he captures it in exhibitions that invite us to analyze, and perhaps even disintegrate, the "ancestral-contemporary" binomial. The concept, developed by Brazilian philosopher Aiton Krenak , posits a notion of temporality, "which, contrary to the idea of ​​progress and the linear perspective of time, addresses the future in direct relation to the past, the territory, and the cosmos," adds Marmor.

And he warns: "Given the boiling point, in recent years, of poetics of the Anthropocene, the temporal paradigm proposed by Krenak is transformed into a methodological tool to address the way in which knowledge and practices originating from ancient worldviews traverse the artistic imagination as a phenomenon specific to these times of vulnerability." This is evident in the three large areas that comprise the exhibition : Ancestral Knowledge , Looking at the Sky More than the Earth , and Lines of Escape from the City , which propose the change of perspective that we urgently need.

The unpredictable encounters are located on the ground floor of the Macro Tower, in one of the busiest areas of the city and home to Banco Macro, which is once again taking the initiative to partner with Meridiano to accompany a new edition of NODO as the main sponsor.

In this setting, the works take on the challenge of reflecting on themselves within this imposing glass space, with its white floors, tall columns, and a wealth of movement unrelated to the art world. Thus, winks and connections are created between Lola Goldstein 's naive scenarios, which begin on the wall and extend to her flower ceramics, which appropriate ancestral oriental repertoires and extend to the other end of the room to reach out to Miranda Sarkis 's drawings, which demonstrate a love for manual labor in the same way that Elida Mendoza also does through ceramics, carrying the legacy of a technique that would otherwise be lost.

Similarly, the objects by Lilia Lucas and Candelaria Aaset , who display their chaguar vessels – containers of secrets and memories – propose to erase the boundaries between art and craftsmanship.

At the other end of the room, sculptures in cedar wood, glass, plaster, and synthetic hair by Carlos Aguirre rise and meet the powerful and diabolical characters featured in the drawings by Sofía Rossa , representative of the new art scene in Rafaela, and a lapidary phrase made of enameled iron, subtle and elegant, by the artist Sol Quirincich , a piece that is part of an extensive body of work she carried out in connection with the work, history, and figure of Lola Mora . "A very small thing in appearance" can be read from a distance. That's what the press said about the great sculptor, underestimating the magnitude of her impeccable talent.

Finally, there's a small area that receives all the afternoon light through the building's large windows. A haven for the beaded pieces by Santa Fe-born Román Vitali and the small bronze, nickel silver, copper, and cement pieces by Patricia Spessot , which cast a poetic and malleable shadow that transforms as the daylight hours pass.

These artists are just a handful of the extensive and diverse group that makes up "Unpredictable Encounters," which opens the door to the possibility of creating a unique visual map and treasuring what the eye captures, sowing spontaneous hints that go beyond the three islands proposed by Marmor, facing the possibility of expanding our present.

"The time has come to reforest our imagination," Lara states when referring to a speech by Krenak that proposes "expanding the scope of our vision and trusting in the construction of new and solid emotional alliances" to return to the city, to life in the concrete, from where we can think of a plan B, a more utopian, free, and powerful scenario . In his text, Marmor revives the idea of ​​"a poetics of urbanism," something that needs to be debated not only here but throughout the world.

However, it's curious and encouraging that many of these images come from less chaotic and crowded territories than this one. Let's plant a tree, raise the forest, find spaces for gardens, and reprogram our habitat through art.

The unpredictable encounters can be visited at the Macro Tower (Av. Madero 1172). On Saturday the 10th, at 3:30 p.m., a free guided tour will be offered to the public as part of NODO's Mediation Program.

To access it, you must register using the link in the bio of the @somosmeridiano Instagram profile.