1
Museu de Arte Contemporânea Armando Martins
Lisbon, Portugal

Lisbon’s new cultural hotspot, the Museu de Arte Contemporânea Armando Martins (Macam), is housed in the 18th-century Palácio Condes da Ribeira Grande a five-star hotel. It is both a gallery and a hotel – the first of its kind in Europe. Founder Armando Martins’s private collection of 600 artworks decorates the walls of both the exhibition areas and the hotel rooms. “This creates an immersive cultural experience,” says Macam director Adelaide Ginga. A night spent in the deconsecrated-chapel-turned-bar before jumping into bed with a masterpiece is an experience indeed.
macam.pt

2
Fenix
Rotterdam, Netherlands

Fenix, a new museum devoted to telling stories of migration through art, will open in May in a former warehouse in the Katendrecht district. While the collection will include chastening photography of refugee camps, lighter pieces will also be scattered throughout. One such example is American artist Red Grooms’s mixed-media, soft-sculpture New York bus, in which visitors will be encouraged to take a seat alongside brightly painted passengers made from foam. “It’s important that the museum stays grounded,” says director Anne Kremers. “And it’s essential that people embrace it locally, in addition to being an international museum.”
fenix.nl

3
Naoshima New Museum of Art
Naoshima, Japan

If art is meant to inspire and revive, what better setting for a gallery than a hilltop perch overlooking the waters of Japan’s Seto Inland Sea? This new Tadao Ando-designed museum, which will open as part of the Benesse Art Site Naoshima, will focus on contemporary Asian art, with its inaugural exhibition featuring works by Takashi Murakami and Cai Guo-Qiang. “It’s not about one museum but an integrated collective of museums sitting in harmony with the islands’ nature and community,” says Benesse Art Site Naoshima’s international artistic director Akiko Miki. “That’s what makes it unique.”
benesse-artsite.jp

4
The Hip Hop Museum,
New York, USA

A museum to celebrate hip hop could only ever have one proper home: the Bronx. “This authenticity can’t be replicated elsewhere,” executive director Rocky Bucano tells monocle. With MCs, DJs, breakers, graffiti artists and other cultural leaders at the helm, the museum will honour pioneers of the art form. As well as showcasing memorabilia and rare artefacts, The Hip Hop Museum will have an in-house radio studio and a theatre for performances from emerging talent and well-known artists. “It’s not just about commemorating the past,” says Bucano. “It’s about grounding the story in its original soil; inspiring the youth who still call these streets home.”
thhm.org

5
Museum of West African Art
Benin City, Nigeria

The tangle of buildings that make up the Museum of West African Art (Mowaa) are clean-lined, low and surrounded by trees. As well as exhibition spaces, the campus hosts a science lab, research facilities and a guesthouse. Though its location in Nigeria’s Benin City might provoke debate about returning the Benin bronzes to Nigeria, Mowaa has not been built as the artefacts’ future home. Crucial to the project is creating practical infrastructure for research, while also serving contemporary artists’ needs. “Mowaa is a statement to the world,” says director Phillip Ihenacho. “It is a vehicle to more firmly ensure that West Africa is part of global art practice and recognised for its contributions.”
wearemowaa.org

6
TeamLab Phenomena,
Abu Dhabi, UAE

Founded in Tokyo in 2001, TeamLab is an art collective that is represented internationally by Pace Gallery, placing it in the esteemed company of artists such as David Hockney and Mark Rothko. While TeamLab’s digital installations lack the tactile qualities of a Rothko canvas, they are similarly immersive, using cutting-edge technologies to create renderings of larger concepts. The collective’s vast new 17,000 sq m space will provide these artworks with a home in Abu Dhabi’s Saadiyat Cultural District – an island destination that also includes branches of the Louvre and Guggenheim. By embracing innovation, TeamLab might just steal the spotlight from these established institutions.
teamlab.art