IT WAS HARD TO GET HERE reads a painted vinyl and plywood bench designed by Finnegan Shannon and located near the entrance of Dib Bangkok. It provides a brief background behind a new museum that opened in the Thai capital in late December—the first of its kind in the city and the country. Stability is something that the Thai art scene lacks, and the launch of the museum marks a major structural change. “In the general art scene here, the ecosystem is developing rapidly,” commented Miwako Tezuka, the museum’s director. “What we need is resilience.”
Located in a converted warehouse designed by WHY Architecture (the same firm behind the Michael C. Rockefeller Wing at the Metropolitan Museum of Art), the museum takes its name from the Thai word “dib,” which means “green” or “natural, authentic state.” The museum’s property includes the private art collection of Thai businessman Petch Osathanugrah, collected over three decades before his death in 2023. It includes nearly 1,000 works by about 200 artists, evenly divided between Asian and non-Asian origins. “There was no institution that was introducing a space that allowed artists from this country and artists from around the world to be equal [in] discussion,” added Tezuka, emphasizing the importance of the museum.
The first exhibition, “(In)Vible Presence” (on view until August 3, 2026), is a meditation on memory activated by Ariana Chaivaranon. “It is very important for local artists to see how they are interacting with something much bigger than the nation or what is currently happening in Thailand,” he told the Observer. “These artists are very involved in the international discussion. However, in Thailand, we only have an internal discussion, partly because of the collections that were shown.” The mise-en-scène at Dib Bangkok shows that these practices were developed in different parts of the country, but Chaivaranon insisted that “visitors can actually see that they have been having conversations for decades.”
He also emphasized how important the museum-going experience is as a foundation for art education, and how Dib Bangkok fills a void in the city’s landscape. In the past decades, “for many of these [Thai] artists, they got their knowledge of international work from slides, books, magazines, and they had no chance to see the international art of their time. Dib provides a site where artists can see these works in person. When you see it in person… it takes on a new dimension that is unattainable through digital media, I mean.” He made an important example of Anselm Kiefer’s observational work, Die verlorene Buchstabean opening in Heidelberg letterpress sprouting tall resin sunflowers. “Sunflowers move in a calm way, don’t they? That’s something you can’t find on the Internet—and what I’m so happy about is that young artists can come here and be inspired by it.”
Dib Bangkok’s 11 indoor galleries are divided into three levels. The ground floor houses the work of Marco Fusinato Constellationsa site-specific commission in which visitors are invited to hit a white wall with a Brooklyn Whopper Model CS38 Cold Steel baseball bat, whose sound is amplified by 120 decibels: a symbolic blow to the pristine environment of the museum. This is followed by works from Jean-Luc Moulène and Ugo Rondinone; nearby, in the gallery of the cone-shaped Chapel, i IncubateSubodh Gupta’s 2010 installation of stainless steel lunch tins (dabbas) topped with candles. (Recent sexual harassment allegations didn’t keep him from being included.) Jannis Kounellis’s 1998 Untitled work, which consisted of four steel panels, I-beams and folded second-hand clothes—useless materials he first used because he couldn’t afford new canvases—works well in conversation with the Thai artists on display in their lively exhibition. thrift, material simplicity.
On the second level, visitors encounter a steel bed by Rebecca Horn, a two-channel video installation by Jinjoon Lee and 22 pages of musical paper by Louise Bourgeois. These pieces are paired with the work of Thai artists, including gelatin silver prints by Surat Osathanugrah—the collector’s father—that depict humble depictions of daily Thai life. Also on view are Navin Rawanchaikul’s portrait sections of elders encased in salvaged medicine bottles (1994) and Somboon Hormtientong’s 1995 installation of scrolled vihara columns laid flat between drinking vessels and glassware. These artists sanctify the traditions that shape the Thai way of life but renew the vision of the culture.
Under the skylight on the top floor, Montien Boonma’s work is the star (arguably the star of the entire museum). The Thai artist studied in Europe in the 1980s, and his sensitive, contemplative work inspires a clash between the ideas of Arte Povera and Thai spirituality. Lotus sound piece (1999-2000, reworked from a smaller version of 1992) stacks 500 terra-cotta stones around a paved lotus flower, celebrating the wrong place, as it does Arokayasala: Temple of Mind (1996), with its medicine drawers surrounding aluminum lungs covered with fragrant herbs. His inclusion in 1998-99 Houses Zodiac models, on a limited scale, of six German buildings on the grounds: visitors can take off their shoes, climb the platform and stand under their bare buildings, smelling of cinnabar.
Outdoor works create a compelling complement to the galleries. Alicja Kwade About Toto (2020), the installation of 11 large stone globes ranging from 70-250 cm in diameter, dot the yard as a game over stones or lost marble; Photo by Pinaree Sanpitak Breast Stupa Topiary (2013), a series of stainless steel forms, dot the upper terrace. Like his signature, James Turrell’s 1988 Straight up installation includes the sky above; The museum hosts dedicated sunrise and sunset programs for visitors. Sho Shibuya’s 85 meter long print on vinyl, REMEMBERwas specially commissioned by the museum, greatly expanded Sunrise through a small window series, in which the artist painted the sensual colors of dawn on the front page of the New York Times.
Emphasis is placed on interactive and tangible activities, for visitors to play. Surasi Kusolwong’s installation with a rolled-up 1965 Volkswagen Beetle suspended from the ceiling acts as a cradle where visitors can sit and watch the video; the installation includes TAO BIN vending machines, where one can buy sour cream Pringles, salty cocktail nuts, Pepsi or Nescafé. “There are works that are delicate, very sensitive, but we don’t want to make our show precious,” Tezuka commented. The museum is not “a high-class institution where everything is well explained. … We want to make sure that we provide [visitors] the opportunity to educate themselves, to have their own creative agency and to be their active audience.”
The first few exhibitions will show the collection, and some galleries will rotate more often than others (the exhibition of Montien Boonma’s works will always be far away because these works have never been seen in context with each other). Regarding how the collection will grow in the future, Chaivaranon confirmed that the center “continues to find work, and I would say that our strategy has several different aspects, but one is very deep. It’s not just one job from big names.” Tezuka added that “the curatorial team continues to research the collection to see what gaps there are in the collection, whether that represents different cultures or techniques that artists around the world are using or experimenting with…
Beyond the museum’s walls, Tezuka spoke of “making power together” in the city’s art scene, citing the community-funded art space BACC, an experimental program at the Bangkok Kunsthalle and the Khao Yai Art Forest art space a few hours outside the city. On the horizon, there will be deCentral, a place dedicated to the creative voices of the region, and the Bangkok Biennale, which began in 2018, will return in autumn 2026. According to Tezuka, “every organization approaches art in a completely different way, bringing different perspectives.” The scene is definitely one to watch.
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