Museums in Shenzhen and Guangzhou are building bridges between Hong Kong and mainland China

Since Hong Kong’s 1997 handover to China, authorities have promoted “integration” across the Greater Bay Area (GBA), which includes Hong Kong, Macao, and nine Guangdong cities such as Guangzhou and Shenzhen, alongside infrastructure projects like the Hong Kong–Macao–Zhuhai Bridge and high-speed rail links. The Art Newspaper reports that, especially since the pandemic, cultural exchange has also grown more organically, with private institutions like Rem Koolhaas–designed Guangdong Times Museum in Guangzhou and Tadao Ando’s He Art Museum in Foshan (opened 2020) becoming active regional players. Two new Shenzhen museums are planned: Tencent’s Róng Museum, led by former M+ and Tai Kwun curator Pi Li, and JD.com’s JD Museum, scheduled to open in 2027 with former Taipei Dangdai director Robin Peckham as executive director. Hong Kong curator Weiwei Wang (Chat) says the key question is whether these corporate museums will build sustainable systems for artists and curators or use art primarily as soft power.

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