Who is Blanca de la Torre, the director who wants to make the IVAM "a permanent agora"?

Blanca de la Torre took charge of the IVAM (Institut Valencià d'Art Modern) on 1 April 2025. Her appointment was formalised by the regional government (Consell) on 6 May 2025, for a five-year term. She becomes the ninth person to lead the institution since its founding in 1986.

Born in León on 14 February 1977, she holds a degree in Art History from the University of León, a doctorate in Fine Arts from the Universidad Complutense de Madrid, and a master's in exhibition space design from the Fundación Antonio Camuñas in Madrid. Her family background is not documented in the sources consulted.

Before Valencia, she made her name as an independent curator and art critic, notably as chief curator of the Helsinki Biennial, with collaborations at MUSAC in León, the Centro de Arte y Naturaleza in Huesca, and the Cuenca Biennial in Ecuador.

"El IVAM funcionará como un ágora permanente, poroso, relacional" ("The IVAM will work as a permanent, porous, relational agora"), she said at her press presentation on 4 April 2025. "Los grandes discursos deben poder contarse de forma sencilla para que toda la sociedad pueda entenderlos" ("Big ideas need to be told simply so that all of society can understand them") (Valencia Plaza, 12 April 2025). "Hemos tenido suficientes distopías, ahora toca construir alternativas" ("We've had enough dystopias, now it's time to build alternatives").

Her 2026 programme aims to be "more feminine and counter-hegemonic," with two new permanent galleries and an exhibition dedicated to the Albufera for the natural park's 40th anniversary. The IVAM has been ranked the top cultural institution in the Valencian Community by the Observatorio de la Cultura for four years running.

Photo credit: photo by Marisa Glez Glez Glez (ARCO Madrid, 2020), CC BY-SA 4.0 licence, Wikimedia Commons.