The Shanghai Rockbund Art Museum, located at the Bund Source (No. 20 Huqiu Road), is an art museum that insists on charging admission. However, on April 17, the Rockbund Art Museum announced that it will implement free admission to all exhibitions starting from May 2.
The historic building where the Rockbund Art Museum is located is the Asiatic Society Building, which was built in 1932. In May 2010, Rockbund opened it to the public as a cultural intervention example of "urban renewal". The opening exhibition "Peasant Da Vinci" caused a great response in the art world. After seeing the free opening announcement of the museum, many people in the circle found that they had not entered or even talked about this museum for a long time.
The exterior of the Rockbund Art Museum. The museum is located in a historic building built in 1932 in the Art Deco style.
On April 17, the Rockbund Art Museum announced that it would open the museum for free: "As an independently operated, privately funded, non-profit art institution, we have always believed that the value of art should not be measured solely by ticket prices or service content. Free admission does not reduce the value of the exhibition, but is a positive choice we have made in the current context." "We hope that the museum will become a truly open space where everyone can come and go freely and experience and participate in art in the way they like."
Not long ago, in January 2025, the museum's artistic director Zhu Xiaorui was appointed as the director and chief curator of the Shanghai Bund Art Museum, fully responsible for the operation and development of the museum. At that time, Zhu Xiaorui said: "Art institutions are one of the few places that can turn the impossible into the possible, providing us with space to imagine and create alternative things."
Why did the sound of an art museum become faint?
On May 2, 2010, on the bank of the Huangpu River, the Rockbund Art Museum opened its inaugural exhibition "Cai Guoqiang: Peasant Da Vinci". At that time, Shanghai was enjoying new international vitality due to the opening of the Shanghai World Expo. In this land that had witnessed the earliest modernization process in modern China, the museum, located in the Bund historical protection building complex, made its "first voice" towards the future with contemporary art.
In 2010, the Shanghai Rockbund Art Museum opened the exhibition "Peasant Da Vinci"
The Asiatic Society Building (RAS, completed in 1932), where the Rockbund Art Museum is located, was transformed into an art museum by British architect David Chipperfield in 2007. The West Bund Art Museum, which opened in 2019, is also his work.
Installation view of “Cai Guo-Qiang: Peasant Da Vinci”, Rockbund Art Museum, 2010
Although the opening exhibition is Cai Guoqiang's "work", the artists involved in the production are unorthodox creators. They are farmers, folk inventors, and craftsmen. Their creations do not come from the academic system, but from the soil of life and their personal "inner drive." This proposal to regard farmers as inventors and practice as art was undoubtedly a strong voice in contemporary art at the time.
The exhibition not only breaks the art world's rigid definition of the identity of an "artist", but also responds to the dialectical relationship between "knowledge", "creativity" and "marginality" in the context of China's social transformation. In a sense, "Peasant Da Vinci" is both an exhibition and an artistic practice and challenge.
On the opening day, many international art professionals, curators, and media gathered together. For a time, "The Bund" and "contemporary art" were more closely linked than ever before. Even 15 years later, looking back at that exhibition, the inspiration it brought is still profound. The Rockbund Art Museum's appearance stated its own position - openness and daring to take risks.
In the following 15 years, as one of the earliest private art galleries in Shanghai, the Rockbund Art Museum collaborated with renowned curators from home and abroad to hold a series of solo exhibitions of well-known contemporary artists, attempting to construct the narrative logic of Chinese contemporary art itself.
Francis Alÿs, Exodus, exhibition view at Rockbund Art Museum, 2018
At the same time, the Rockbund Art Museum has always maintained a close dialogue with international contemporary art. Many international artists' first solo exhibition projects in mainland China took place here, such as the solo exhibition "Consumption" (curated by Hasegawa Yuko) by Belgian artist Francis Alÿs at the end of 2018. At that time, many art museum exhibitions gradually began to cater to the needs of clocking in, but "Consumption" was different from those exhibitions that emphasized visual impact and "immersive experience", retaining the uncertainty and restrained expression in Alÿs's creation. Especially in the Chinese society that has also experienced rapid urbanization, population mobility and the reshaping of the value system, watching Alÿs has a particularly complex meaning, which seems to guide the viewer to re-examine the position of "people" in the city.
At that time, the Shanghai Bund Art Museum was undoubtedly an institution that was continuously associated with contemporary art phenomena, including the "Guest Room" project, which was a local study of buildings and residents around the Bund, cooperation with surrounding schools, and the introduction of cross-border projects such as modern dance and art nightlife into the museum space.
Under the night sky, the east gate entrance of the Rockbund Art Museum is located on the Museum Square.
After the east gate of the Shanghai Rockbund Art Museum is opened, it is connected to the museum square. The picture shows Li Yuntian's work "Awakening" during the Bund Architecture Festival. Photo: Yan Yufeng; Image source: Rockbund Source
However, at some point, the Rockbund Art Museum gradually "disappeared" - from an art museum that continued to speak out, lead and drive the cultural ecology of the Bund area with art, to now becoming an embellishment of the commercial district. Especially in the second half of 2023, after 17 years of urban renewal and construction, the entire Rockbund Source was completed, and the new entrance of the Rockbund Art Museum was connected to the museum square, which should have ushered in a broader prospect. However, with the opening of famous shops and various restaurants, the Rockbund Art Museum is no longer the main destination in this area. The rhythm of its exhibitions, the perspective of curation and the public attention are difficult to compare with its early influence.
This change may be closely related to the curatorial direction of the museum and its decision-making team. In the early days, the Rockbund Art Museum had internationally renowned curators such as Hou Hanru, Biljana, and Larice Frogier, who brought projects full of critical thinking and global resources. However, with the replacement of core curators and academic consultants, the museum's curatorial logic and institutional temperament have also changed - it seems to have entered a closed circle. Of course, this change may also be related to the change in the financial support behind the museum.
From a larger cultural perspective, the number of art galleries in Shanghai has increased rapidly in recent years. Shanghai Pudong Art Museum and West Bund Art Museum have planned exhibitions with their strong financial strength and international vision, and have received support from world-class art museums to launch a series of major exhibitions. In addition, Shanghai Museum, Shanghai Museum of Contemporary Art, Long Museum, China Art Museum (Shanghai Art Museum), Shanghai School of Art and other venues with larger scale and more resources have attracted more international exhibitions and well-known artists' projects. The voice of the Rockbund Art Museum has gradually weakened, and its planning has fallen into a disadvantage. The exhibitions it has held rarely have a real impact.
The Pudong Art Museum and the Spanish Prado National Museum jointly presented the exhibition "Glorious Times: Spanish Past in the Prado Museum".
Judging from the exhibition projects in recent years, the positioning of the Rockbund Art Museum seems to be increasingly unclear, and it has many shortcomings in connecting Shanghai's young art groups and local cultural production. In the trend of community connection and cross-field cooperation, the Rockbund Art Museum has also been trying to make efforts, but it seems to have achieved very little results. All of this has caused the Rockbund Art Museum to gradually fade out of Shanghai's art ecology and become a deserted project in the commercial district.
However, the Bund is the core area of Shanghai's many cultural and natural landscapes, and the area and building where the Rockbund Art Museum is located still have considerable advantages and cannot be replicated. This announcement of free opening may guide people in the neighborhood to return to the art museum.
As the Rockbund Art Museum said when announcing the free admission to the exhibition: "The museum is thinking: when price is no longer the threshold for admission, what else can serve as a more meaningful way for the audience to connect with the museum?"
In 2017, the Rockbund Art Museum held an exhibition titled “Philippe Parreno: Together in This Moment”.
Besides being free or paid, visitors are more concerned about the exhibition itself
If we measure the value of an art museum by “free” or “paid”, it may be far behind the complexity of reality. “Free” may be a way to increase public attention, but what really determines whether the audience is willing to enter an art museum is always the content and quality of the exhibition itself.
This is particularly evident in Shanghai's art ecology over the past few years. The paid special exhibitions at the Shanghai Museum are often full; the Pudong Art Museum, which charges admission, has frequently been on the hot search due to the volume of its imported exhibitions, international brands, and visual impact. This proves that whether or not to charge admission is not the decisive factor in "art thresholds." Of course, there are also private art galleries that quietly left the market in this round of art museum competition.
Under this trend, exhibitions are endowed with multiple functions such as "aesthetic value", "learning value", "experience value", "check-in value" and "social value". We have to admit that today's audiences are becoming more and more discerning. They are willing to pay for good exhibitions and dare to say no to bad exhibitions. Whether it is charged or free, and the price of the ticket is not the key. The key is whether the quality of the exhibition matches the price and whether it can establish a real ideological connection with the audience.
Rockbund Art Museum Highlights “A Better Life” project site
In contrast, although the Rockbund Art Museum has adopted a "free" strategy, it remains to be seen whether this policy change can lead to an increase in the popularity and influence of its exhibitions.
Regardless of whether it charges a fee or not, the quality of exhibitions, public education, localism, and research is still the key to measuring whether an art museum can continue to be popular. Similar to the Bund Art Museum, the Shanghai Duolun Art Museum, which has been established for more than 20 years, is also located in a historical district and has also experienced highlights and silence. As the first public contemporary art museum in China, contemporary art was not widely known to the public in 2003 when it opened. Through the continuous voices of artists and curators, the public began to understand the forefront of art from the art museum, and also left archives for the development of contemporary art in Shanghai and even China in the 21st century. However, around 2010, the Duolun Art Museum began to be silent, and even the site was once converted into the office of the demolition office, and no one mentioned it for a while.
Opening ceremony of "Iteration 20: Special Exhibition for the 20th Anniversary of Shanghai Duolun Museum of Modern Art" in 2023
Around 2018, the museum reorganized and repositioned its future development direction, returning more to the vision and original intention of building the museum. Starting from 2020, with limited funds and venues, it has successively brought in exhibitions and activities with academic value and ideological depth, established the "Annual of Contemporary Chinese Video Art" project, and brought academic activities to the Yangtze River Delta, gradually developing into an art museum with high academic standards and influence. In addition to academics, it also pays attention to connections with the community and the public, and many exhibitions have become topics of discussion among young people on the Internet. In fact, the Duolun Museum of Modern Art is free - "free and paid" has never been a key factor for art museums.
The Long Museum (West Bund), which opened in 2014, has always been one of the landmarks of Shanghai West Bund. It is also a private art museum. Although there have been disputes about the high ticket prices, the series of major exhibitions held before and the currently exhibited "The Grand View of Heaven and Earth - The Imprint of Civilization Across Time" have attracted many visitors with their unique exhibition planning that combines history and art. This also proves once again that whether it is charged or free, the core competitiveness of the art museum is inseparable from the quality of the exhibition and the depth of the curatorial work.
The Long Museum’s “Great View of Heaven and Earth – Imprints of Civilization Across Time” exhibition
Regardless of whether they are free or not, art galleries need to rethink: How can art galleries provide a space for viewing exhibitions while also providing a forum for thought?
Free admission means that the art museum suddenly has to face the entire public, including those who would not have entered if a fee was charged. How to respond to the public expectations of this "openness" through exhibitions and other products requires careful research and planning by the art museum.
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