Paris Pompidou Centre seals Shanghai art gallery deal

The Pompidou Centre in Paris, which houses the world’s second biggest collection of modern art, has sealed a deal to open a franchise gallery in Shanghai, French President Emmanuel Macron said on Tuesday.

Macron made the announcement after holding talks with President Xi Jinping during his first state visit to China.

He did not give more details but the Pompidou Centre had announced plans for the gallery in July, 2017.

It will show around 20 exhibitions over five years in a wing of the new West Bund Art Museum, which is being built in Shanghai’s cultural district by British architect David Chipperfield.

The Paris gallery, which also has plans to open branches in South Korea and Belgium, has been in talks with the Chinese authorities for more than a decade.

In 2016 it staged its first show in China called Masterpieces from the Centre Pompidou 1906-77 featuring work by Pablo Picasso, Marcel Duchamp and other big names at the Shanghai Exhibition Centre.

The gallery has signed a protocol with the publiclyowned West Bund Group for a renewable five-year deal to stage exhibitions in the new museum from 2019.

The West Bund Group has been behind efforts to turn part of the formerly industrial Xuhui district of the city into a 11-kilometer long “cultural corridor” along the Huangpu River.