Art walks: explore modern galleries and museums at the West Bund
It’s impossible to avoid Shanghai’s newest art district (and hell, you wouldn’t want to anyways). Having sprung up over the past few years, it looks like the big guns at the West Bund are here to stay.
SCoP
Opened in 2015 by Hong Kong-born photographer Liu Heung Shing, Shanghai Center of Photography’s (SCoP) unique space consists of a labyrinth of rooms in various shapes and sizes. The elegant architecture and minimalist design make it the perfect place to display some of the art world’s classic photographic works – and it offers a quieter and significantly lower-cost refuge (40RMB entry) from some of the areas larger and showier museums. At the moment you can catch A Long View, a retrospective of Lois Conner's remarkable landscapes of China since the 1980s shot using a banquet camera – covering cities, natural landscapes and lotus flowers.
SCoP is at 2555 Longteng Avenue, near Longlan Lu (6428 9516).
Little treats
Tucked away behind SCoP you’ll find a collection of free galleries to peruse some classy and high-quality art. ShanghART (2555 Longteng Avenue) holds a large second location here to accompany its M50 bolthole. Other spots include Don Gallery (2870 Longteng Avenue), Qiao Space (2555 Longteng Avenue), MadeIn Gallery and Edouard Malingue Gallery (both at 2879 Longteng Avenue), all of which offer a range of works from outstanding contemporary artists, making this the perfect spot to get lost in creativity.
Yuz Museum
Photograph: JJYPHOTO courtesy Yuz Museum Shanghai
Whilst the arrival of a number of quirky, stylish galleries have contributed to the West Bund challenging M50 for the title of Shanghai art hotspot, it’s the giants of the scene causing the real stir. Yuz Museum plays no small part in this, with 9,000sqm of space set inside an old airplane hangar. Last year, Yuz exhibited the works of pop and graffiti artist Brian Donnelly – aka KAWS – and in previous years has hosted Alberto Giacometti’s sublime retrospective (2016), and the famous Rain Room in 2015. With shows like these, Yuz seems set to be in it for the long haul as one of Shanghai’s most impressive museums.
Yuz Museum is at 35 Fenggu Lu, near Longteng Avenue (6426 1901).
Long Museum
A pleasant 20-minute stroll along the riverfront from Yuz Museum you'll find the Long Museum at the West Bund – the impressive sister venue to the Long Museum in Pudong – offering up the extensive private art collection of elusive tycoon Liu Yiqian and his wife Wang Wei. Long Museum has previously hosted big-ticket exhibits like Immersive Light, an unmissable exhibition by world-renowned Californian artist James Turrell. This is a space that knows what it’s doing, and it’s doing it well.
Long Museum is at 3398 Longteng Avenue near Ruining Lu.