For over a decade, the Museum of Old and New Art (Mona) have reigned as the world’s most unapologetic disruptor of the traditional gallery ecosystem. Carved into the sandstone cliffs of Berriedale, Tasmania, David Walsh’s subterranean “secular temple” stripped away wall labels, embraced the hedonistic and the macabre, and turned museum-going into an immersive experience where death, sex, and human absurdity sit side by side.

Now, the Hobart-based institution is preparing to export its subversive DNA across the sea, anchoring its first international outpost along the bustling banks of Bangkok’s Chao Phraya River.

Slated to open in 2029, Mona Bangkok emerges through a strategic partnership with Thai real estate developer Asset World Corp (AWC). The new venue will serve as the cultural anchor for the ongoing transformation of Asiatique the Riverfront, a historic former dockyard evolving into a massive lifestyle district.

Rather than duplicating the dark, cavernous architecture of its Tasmanian predecessor, the Bangkok venue aims to integrate directly with the urban fabric of one of Southeast Asia’s primary cultural crossroads.

The wider development features an ambitious cross-river cable car project budgeted at over THB 2 billion (£44.6 million), physically connecting the museum to mixed-use developments along the riverbank. For Walsh—a professional gambler turned cultural iconoclast—the project represents an opportunity to test two decades of experimental museum curation within a high-density global tourism hub.

The DarkLab Strategy: Illuminating the Unorthodox

The creative force behind the Bangkok expansion is DarkLab, Mona’s specialized production engine responsible for Hobart’s famous winter festival, Dark Mofo. Led by project director Leigh Carmichael, DarkLab plans to pair international contemporary works with new commissions from local Thai artists.

Carmichael revealed that Mona Bangkok’s inaugural exhibition program will revolve around the concept of light—treated simultaneously as an optical medium, a spiritual metaphor, and a tool of political revelation.

This international move comes at a strategic turning point for the institution. Following the cancellation of the Transformer installation in Tasmania’s Huon Valley due to rising construction costs, Mona Bangkok represents the museum’s primary focus for large-scale spatial experimentation.

By collaborating with local arts networks—including venues tied to the Bangkok Art Biennale—Mona Bangkok intends to challenge the sterile “white cube” model, replacing it with an unpredictable space where global contemporary discourse collides with local artistic expression.