Image: Tate © Ben Fisher | Kerstin Mogull (left), Managing Director, Tate; Bao Shuyi (right), Vice General Manager, Lujiazui Group
Tate has signed a Memorandum of Understanding with Chinese state-owned developer Shanghai Lujiazui Group to collaborate in developing Shanghai’s Pudong Museum of Art.
The arrangement will also see Tate provide artworks from its collection for several exhibitions once the arts space opens in 2021.
The Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) sees Tate, enterprise incubator Lujiazui Group, and design firm Jean Nouvel Architects unite around a plan to deliver the Shanghai-based gallery.
As per the terms of the agreement, Tate will provide Pudong Museum of Art (PMoA) with training in fields including visitor services, operations, art handling and exhibition management, audience development, and learning.
Construction of the PMoA, which is situated in Shanghai’s Lujiazui Central Business District, is already under way and is slated to be completed in early 2021; opening to the public later in the same year.
“We recognise and admire the ambition behind this new public art institution and are excited to be working with the Pudong Museum of Art to advise them on their historic journey,” noted Kerstin Mogull, Tate’s Managing Director.
“Tate’s best ever attended exhibition was held in Shanghai last year,” Mogull added. “We are keen to deepen our engagement with audiences there. We are delighted to have the opportunity to lend our expertise and experience to assist Lujiazui in that goal over the course of the next three years.”
Once completed, the six-storey PMoA will stand 30 metres tall and feature combined exhibition floor space of 40,590 square metres.
Zhu Di, General Director, Art Department of the Ministry of Culture and Tourism of the People’s Republic of China, who was present as the MoU was signed, said he was “delighted to have Tate as a consultant to the Pudong Museum of Art,” adding that “civilisations are enriched through learning from each other.”
A major goal of the project is to “contribute to the promotion of cultural exchange worldwide, and the communication between the East and the West,” Zhu continued.
The Chinese gallery’s inaugural exhibition will feature work from the Tate collection, with two subsequent shows offering a Chinese debut to other works from Tate’s national collection.