The leading Chinese gallery ShanghArt opened a new location in the West Bund, Shanghai’s emerging waterfront arts district, on 8 September. The 2,015 sq. m gallery is part of a new cluster of spaces and studios around the West Bund Arts Center.
This is the gallery’s third current location in Shanghai, joining its twin exhibition spaces and offices at 50 Moganshan Lu, locally known as M50, and a warehouse in the northern suburb of Taopu. ShanghArt has additional outposts in Beijing and Singapore. “Moganshan was good 15 years ago, when there was nowhere else to go; here, it is very specifically for contemporary art,” says ShanghArt’s owner Lorenz Helbling. He opened the gallery in 1996, in the lobby of the Portman Ritz-Carleton in downtown Shanghai, before moving it to the similarly central Fuxing Park.
The gallery’s expansion to the West Bund follows the lead of many local artists, such as Ding Yi and Zhou Tiehai, who recently moved their studios to the district. Zhou also directs the West Bund Art and Design Fair and unofficially spearheads the area’s development. Last year, the Yuz and Long Museums opened there and were joined by the Shanghai Centre of Photography this May. “There are lots of spaces [in the West Bund], it is the beginning of something,” Helbling says. “Moganshan was like this when it was something new, a bit far away. It is quite seducing.”
Less alluring is the cost, which “is more per square-meter than Moganshan Lu,” says Helbling, although since it is a new building, it comes with amenities like air conditioning. The building, designed by Margo Renisio, resembles stacked shipping containers. It is due to be topped by a rooftop a terrace. The inaugural show of works by Geng Jianyi (until 22 October) occupies the first floor of three. Since the upper floors are still under construction, after the show ends, the gallery will temporary close until the spring so that the building can be completed. “It is a step for us that is not too easy,” Helbling says, but he adds that the gallery and the neighborhood “can mature together”.
The private collector Qiao Zhibing also opened a new space in the West Bund yesterday, and is hosting a show with the commercial gallery Hauser & Wirth of paintings by the Polish artist Wilhelm Sasnal (until 13 September). After that show ends, “we will just do what I’m interested in, it’s not planned out yet,” says Qiao. “I hope it will be a space for contemporary art education, and for friends to come over.”
Qiao has a two-year lease on the property, compared to ShanghArt’s five, after which his long-anticipated performance space in a nearby cluster of oil tanks should be ready to open. The collector is of an early supporter of the area, with his art-filled karaoke club Shanghai Night nearby. The West Bund “will become an art district like Moganshan Lu,” Qiao says, “though for now there are fewer galleries, and it is more design oriented”.
