May opening for new art museum in Shanghai

A new museum, the UCCA Edge, is to be unveiled in Shanghai on May 1. 

UCCA is one of the top three contemporary art museums in China and its new space in the city will occupy three levels of a newly built tower.

Designed by New York-based architecture and design firm SO-IL, the museum will include 1,700 square meters of gallery space as well as a wraparound outdoor terrace and public space.

UCCA was founded in 2007 by Guy and Myriam Ullens as the Ullens Center for Contemporary Art. In 2017, it evolved into the UCCA Group under the ownership and stewardship of a new group of patrons and shareholders. 

The historical core of UCCA Group is UCCA Beijing, housed in the former factory chambers of the 798 Art District. In 2018, UCCA Dune opened to the public. The art museum is buried under a sand dune by the Bohai Sea in Beidaihe, 300 kilometers east of Beijing.

As an integral part of the UCCA constellation, the new space in Shanghai will mount exhibitions of leading Chinese and international artists, some developed exclusively for local audience, some touring from other UCCA locations.

The UCCA Edge will open with two exhibitions. One is "City on the Edge: Art and Shanghai at the Turn of the Millennium," curated by UCCA director Philip Tinari. The other, "Urban Theater: A Comedy in Four Acts," is a group exhibition of outdoor sculptures linked through the use of humor and inspiration from ancient Greek theater.

There will also be a show of new paintings and archival material by renowned artist Liu Xiaodong, and an Andy Warhol retrospective presented in collaboration with the Andy Warhol Museum in Pittsburgh, the US.

Ti Gong