Universal modernity

Over the past decades, the collection has grown to include outstanding pieces of Chinese and international art from the 20th and 21st centuries, Zhang said in a video message at the opening.

"We were surprised to see that the collection of Powerlong Museum was bigger and richer than what we expected before arriving here," Sun Dongdong, executive curator of the show, said as he guided the media on a preview on Nov 18.

The exhibition aims to present the evolution of ideas and dialogue in art over the past century between China and the world, Sun adds.

The exhibition features six chapters, and visitors are advised to start from the underground Hall No 7, where The Bund Without Us, a 27-meter-high and 4-meter-wide painting, created from the explosion of fireworks by contemporary Chinese artist Cai Guoqiang takes center stage. The work was created for the opening of Cai's solo exhibition at Power Station of Art in Shanghai in 2014, and represents his imagination of the Bund taken over by nature after the destruction of human civilization.

Liang Shen, the architect invited to design the exhibition space, built a wall in the hall to separate the giant artwork from other exhibits. A window on the wall gives the audience a different perspective, and when people turn around a corner, the spectacular artwork emerges in its entirety.