Hong Kong’s New M+ Museum Showcases Asian Visual Art

M+, one of the world’s largest museums dedicated exclusively to modern Asian visual arts, opened last month in Hong Kong. The inverted-T-shaped facility—whose name stands for “museum plus”—is said to have cost well over $760 million. 

The 700,000-square-foot building, designed by the world-renowned Swiss architectural firm of Herzog & de Meuron, includes over 6,400 works and 183,000 square feet of exhibition space divided into 33 galleries. There are also three cinemas, a media library, a learning hub, and a roof garden overlooking Victoria Harbour. Topping the building is a tower made of 423,000 glazed terracotta tiles with one of the world’s largest multimedia screens, which displays M+ content. The tower houses museum offices, a research center, and three restaurants.  

“Our vision for M+ is to build a community of learning that encourages empathy, respect, and multiple perspectives, and creates an active visual culture that connects people, objects, and spaces,” says Suhanya Raffel, the museum’s director.

Unfortunately, M+ is already under fire for censorship since it decided not to display a piece by Chinese artist and dissident Ai Weiwei. The work, part of “Study of Perspective: Tian’anmen (1997),” depicts Ai raising a middle finger at Beijing’s Tiananmen Square, where, on June 4,1989, the People’s Liberation Army cracked down on pro-democracy protesters and killed hundreds if not thousands of people. Pro-Beijing politicians said Ai’s work was “spreading hatred against China” and could violate the city’s sweeping national security law. Weiwei has criticized the museum’s decision to censor his work. M+ insists it is simply acting in accordance with the law.