The 2017 debut of the Museum of Modern and Contemporary Art in Nusantara, better known as Museum MACAN, was a much-needed shot in the arm for Jakarta’s cultural scene. It’s well worth the 40-minute taxi ride from the downtown area to the workaday Kebon Jeruk district, where London-based MET Studio has inserted 2,000 square meters of exhibition galleries, an indoor sculpture garden, and educational spaces into the podium of a commercial tower. Inside the expansive glass-walled foyer, visitors get their first encounter with a permanent collection drawn from local businessman Haryanto Adikoesoemo’s trove of more than 800 artworks. Alongside high-profile Indonesian visual artists such as Arahmaiani and Entang Wiharso, Mark Rothko, Yayoi Kusama, and Walter Spies are represented. The institution seeks to be a global platform for both local and international talent: it has mounted the largest-ever solo show for Japanese performance and installation artist Chiharu Shiota, followed by another focused on Filipino husband-and-wife duo Isabel and Alfredo Aquilizan. Exhibitions change four to six times a year, so there’s always something new to discover. —James Louie
museummacan.org
+62 21 2212 1888
AKR Tower Level M, Jl. Panjang No. 5, Kebon Jeruk, Jakarta, Indonesia