Artists

Ritu Sarin, Tenzing Sonam, Sunmin Park, Francesco Simeti, Lin Chi-Wei

Press release

MAO is delighted to present the third edition of Contemporary Expressions, the museum's artist residency and site-specific commission project that invites contemporary artists to enter into dialogue with the collection and the ever-changing museum. The project offers fresh interpretations of the works in the museum's collection, giving new meaning and voice to objects that have remained 'silent' for far too long, transforming the visitor experience. This work is carried out by artists, curators and culture professionals from across three continents. In the museum's Tibetan section, the filmmaker-artist duo Ritu Sarin and Tenzing Sonam are presenting a sound installation that reinterprets the museum's invaluable collection - unique in all the world - of fragments from the Densatil Monastery in central Tibet, renowned for its extraordinary reliquaries, richly decorated with refined bas-reliefs and Buddhist sculptures. Founded in 1198 and the centre of power of the Phagmo Drupa dynasty, which governed the country between the 14th and 15th centuries, the monastery was sacked and destroyed, along with more than 6,000 other religious institutions in Tibet during the Cultural Revolution, its treasures dispersed among museums and private collections across the world. Silently displayed in the museum's galleries for nearly twenty years, these fragments have been brought to life by the artists' installation. Through a personal narrative, it is now the sculpture of Virūḍhaka (Guardian King of the South) – one of the four statues that defended the cardinal points of the monastery's multi-tiered stupas – that gives voice to the beauty and tragic history of Densatil. In the Chinese galleries, Korean artist Sunmin Park presents the video installation Pale Pink Universe (2025), alongside a new series of drawings that explore the relationship between nature and human activity, through the lens of agriculture and winemaking. The work grew out of a collaboration with the artist that began in conjunction with the exhibition Rabbit Inhabits the Moon, held at MAO in October 2024, and is part of the agreement between the museum and Artists for Frescobaldi. In the corridor between the China and the Japan galleries, Francesco Simeti is presenting a new site-specific installation that concludes the project he began at MAO during the first edition of Contemporary Expressions. Description Generale (A Historical Map of the Other) combines wallpaper, a series of fabric elements and light-emitting glass objects, taking the visitor on a journey that retraces a chapter in cultural history across geographic and temporary borders. The work, acquired for the MAO permanent collection, offers a radical rereading of the history of the Silk Road, intertwining reflections on the Orientalist appropriation of this ancient 'Eurasian crossroads'.