A historical compound that used to house, among other things, the old Navy Club, the Columbia Country Club--a popular hangout for Americans in the 20s and 40s--and a mansion built for Sun Ke, the son of Dr. Sun Yat-Sen, by Hungarian architect Lazlo Hudec. After the... Read more
Tank Shanghai is the brainchild of Chinese collector Qiao Zhibing, opened in March 2019. The 60,000 square meter complex, the size of 11 American football fields, turns the former oil storage tanks for the Longhua Airport into galleries, bookstores, restaurants and... Read more
As of 2016, this is one of the nicest and most futuristic places to see a movie in Shanghai. It's big: 6 halls and 1046 seats total. Facilities are great, with comfortable theater areas, and clean and comfortable 3D glasses. They've got RealD technology, if you're... Read more
Located in the basement of a cluster of highrises on Huashan Lu, Propaganda Poster Art Center has a collection of hundreds of original posters from the Mao years as well as a gift shop selling Mao-era paraphernalia, original and copied propaganda posters, and various... Read more
A vast art museum, housed in the former Chinese Expo pavilion over in Pudong. Works on display span modern and contemporary periods, and there's also a steady rotation of temporary exhibitions, including lots from abroad. Good to know: it's free to get in, but you... Read more
The PSA is an impressive but cumbersome space, a huge building likened by curator Qui Zhijie to London’s Tate Modern. The PSA may have similar hardware to that legendary institution but it doesn’t have the software — the staffing, budgets, etc — to match.... Read more
Opened in 2014, the Long Museum West Bund is the second of Chinese billionaire collectors Liu Yiqian and Wang Wei's expanding empire. The architecture is stunning - right on the waterfront, it was designed by Liu Yichun of Atelier Deshaus. Inside is a veritable who's... Read more
Established in 2017 and dubbed Shanghai’s first 'night museum,' for its later opening hours, HOW is a 7,000sqm, 3-story building, adjacent to a five-star art hotel. It also... Read more
50 Moganshan Lu, better known as M50, is Shanghai's most famous "gallery district," home to over 50 gallery spaces in Shanghai, and offers a cross-section of emerging Shanghainese and Chinese artists, working in a wide range of styles and mediums. Great for a day's... Read more
This new location for Shanghai Natural History Museum opened in Spring 2015. Shiny and new, its exhibitions are well funded, curated, and researched. Features dino-bots and lots of taxidermy, live bugs and amphibians, fossils and skeletons. Maximum educational... Read more
Opened in May 2014, YUZ Museum Shanghai is the second major private institution to grace the city's West Bund area. This one is the brainchild of Chinese-Indonesian collector, Budi Tek and will host rotating exhibitions sourced from his own massive collection of... Read more
A former coal storage facility known as the Lao Bai Du Coal Warehouse (老白渡煤仓), it was transformed by Atelier Deshaus (who also did the West Bund’s Long Museum) into a museum. It has retained many of its original structures, like a long, elevated channel that runs... Read more
One of Shanghai's best and most visited museums, the Urban Planning Exhibition Hall at People's Square documents the changing face of Shanghai and is an essential vising point for those interested in the evolution of the city. A perfect scale model of the entire city... Read more
The best part of the Museum of Contemporary Art Shanghai (MOCA) is the prime location smack dab in a lovely green portion of People's Square. Sunlight and panoramic views pour in through the museum's floor to ceiling glass walls. International exhibitions are the... Read more
Non-profit organization founded by Fosun Group and Fosun Foundation. The Art Center is co-designed by British design firm Foster + Partners and creative director Heatherwick Studio. The building features three layers of moving veils in appearance. The Art Center... Read more
Opened in Spring 2011, the Shanghai Museum of Glass is a welcome addition to the city's cultural scene. Housed in a renovated former factory, the beautifully displayed exhibits guide visitors through the history of glass, some of its lesser known applications and a... Read more
This gauche, sprawling palace on Nanjing Lu gifted by the Soviets to China in 1954 is tough to miss. Throughout the year it is the home to more than a dozen international exhibitions ranging from ShContemporary art show to the so-called "Millionaire's Fair." Read more
The Pottery Workshop is a professional pottery studio, started in Hong Kong in 1985, with the Shanghai branch opening in 2002. They focus on ceramic art education for adults, though also children's classes. The equipment's imported from the US and Japan. The second... Read more
Since its inaugural exhibition, “Peasant Da Vincis”, in 2010, RAM has been on some next-level shit. Nowhere else in the city has such a strong events program or such consistent, well produced shows. RAM has held major solos for some of China’s most celebrated... Read more
Powerlong is a real estate company and this museum is the show-and-tell space for its chairman, Xu Jiankang. Xu is a high-profile rich AF art collector and this is his non-profit space. The 23,000 square meter museum is anchored by a stunning minimalist ramp that... Read more
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