The Bangkok Art and Culture Centre (BACC) is a twenty-five thousand square-meter, eleven-storey mid-town facility with galleries, performance spaces, a library and meeting rooms. Conceived and pushed for since 1997 by a network of ar

tists, the Centre has finally been built by the Bangkok Metropolitan Administration. To be administered by the Bangkok Art and Culture Centre Foundation, it aims to give contemporary art the right physical infrastructure and to enhance the role of art in the city’s cultural life. It hopes to attract many different target groups : from traditionalist to modern, as well as the lifestyle crowd. It should pull in new audiences because it is conveniently located in the middle of town at the Pathumwan Intersection and because the building itself creates its own ‘street’ atmosphere with shops and restaurants – come to eat, stay for art.

With exhibition and events not only involving art but also theatre, film, writing, music and design, the place will become a creative hub, an ‘art junction’ where all can cross paths and meet. We hope for vibrant and relevant new culture to emerge from dialogue between artists working in different media, and from interaction between artists and audiences. We believe it will both strengthen Bangkok’s existing cultural and intellectual life, and lead in new directions.