The first issue of Índex focuses on the question of artistic research, which it places at the heart of the Museum’s current concerns. To this aim this issue features collaborations by Bartomeu Marí, director of MACBA, the philosopher Christoph Menke, the editor of the magazine Chus Martínez, the historian and curator Piotr Piotrowski, the researcher Elizabeth Suzanne Kassab, the artists Julie Ault and Natascha Sadr Haghighian, the philosopher and director of MACBA’s Independent Study Programme Xavier Antich, and the art historian Johanna Burton.

The second issue of Índex features collaborations by the writer, teacher and media-activist Franco Berardi, the art historian, critic and curator Nataša Ilić, the editor of the magazine Chus Martínez, the philosopher and writer Reza Negarestani, the artistic collective The Otolith Group and the philosopher, professor and essayist José Luis Pardo.

The third issue of Índex features collaborations by the Director of MACBA’s Independent Studies Programme (PEI) Xavier Antich, the artistic director and co-founder of the Cinémathèque de Tanger Yto Barrada, the curator, writer and Associate Professor and Vice-Director of the Museu de Arte Contemporãnea da Universidade de São Paulo Cristina Freire, the full professor of Comparative Literature at Princeton University Daniel Heller-Roazen, the artist, musician and writer Hassan Khan, the art critic Marie Muracciole and the Mexican artist José Antonio Vega Macotela.

In the early years of the 21st century, Europe seems uncertainly placed between a deep sense of its own historical importance and anxiety about where it may go in the future. The European project, which for many of our institutions was a guiding principle, has run aground on the rocks of neo-liberalism and an economic priority that forgot about society’s politi- cal and cultural dimensions. The national project, on which the foundations of our museums (along with most of Europe’s other cultural institutions) were based, retains little of its 19th century ambitions to progressive, democratic thinking. As a result, cultural ...