Chanel is now the lead sponsor of Hong Kong’s M+ museum. It will be the lead partner for the next three years and will support not only the museum’s film programming but also its exhibitions, artist programs, and other projects. M+ opened nearly five years ago, in 2021. Chanel has supported M+ since 2023. The partnership previously focused on experimental cinema, film restoration, and building the contemporary art museum’s moving-image collection.
The focal point of the deal is a new initiative called “Pioneering Visions,” which will showcase artists whose work has “shaped contemporary art and visual culture,” with an emphasis on artists from Hong Kong, mainland China, and Asia writ large. It will feature work by artists such as Kimsooja, Duan Jianyu, Cao Fei, and Yu Ji. A solo exhibition by Sarah Sze, “Centrifuge,” will open early next year.
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Chanel already supports a number of major cultural institutions, including the British Film Institute (BFI), Berlin’s Hamburger Bahnhof, and the Venice Biennale. Partnering with M+ is the house’s latest foray into supporting art institutions. Yana Peel, Chanel’s president of arts, culture, and heritage, said in a statement that M+ is one of the house’s earliest institutional art partners in Asia. “Now, after successful programs focused on moving image, we are [broadening] our scope,” she said. “M+ is so much more than a museum: it is the epicenter for dialogue within Asia and between Asia and the world.”
Chanel has supported the restoration of nine Hong Kong feature films since it began its partnership with M+. M+ has acquired sixty experimental moving-image works, about half of them from Hong Kong. Chanel also supported a senior curatorial position dedicated to moving image and the institution’s Asian Avant-Garde Film Festival.
In a statement, museum director Suhanya Raffel said that the collaboration “will provide deeper access to lesser-known stories of significant artists of our time, creating new opportunities for engagement, exchange, and discovery for audiences in Hong Kong and internationally.”