Twelve Trailblazing Women Artists Transform Interior Spaces in 'Dream Rooms'

"With its roots in the conceptual and immersive experiments of the Dadaists and Surrealists in the early 20th century, installation art emerged as its own genre in the late 1950s. The approach gained momentum during the next couple of decades, usually revolving around site-specific responses to interior spaces. Taking many forms, installations sometimes incorporate light, sound, projections, performances, and participatory or immersive elements."

""While many of these works were made by women, histories of art havetended to focus on male artists," says a statement from M+ in Hong Kong, which is currently presenting Dream Rooms: Environments by Women Artists 1950s-Now. The show "addresses this imbalance by foregrounding the visionary contributions of women artists." Dream Rooms features 12 room-scale installations created by artists located across four continents. Originating at Haus der Kunst München in 2023 with the title Inside Other Spaces, the exhibition then traveled to M+, where the artworks have been reconstructed."

"Three new works have been commissioned from three Asian artists specifically for this exhibition. These include Pinaree Sanpitak's "The House Is Crumbling," which was first conceived in 2017 and is reimagined for Dream Rooms. Chiharu Shiota's "Infinite Memory" features a cascade of the artist's signature red string, and Kimsooja 's atmospheric "To Breathe" is composed of translucent film on window that diffracts the light into prismatic patterns around the museum."

Installation art originated from Dadaist and Surrealist experiments in the early 20th century and became a distinct genre in the late 1950s, often as site-specific responses within interior spaces. Dream Rooms at M+ in Hong Kong foregrounds room-scale installations by women artists from the 1950s to the present, reconstructing twelve works that span four continents. The show includes historic pieces such as Yamazaki Tsuruko's Red (shape of mosquito net) (1956) and Aleksandra Kasuba's Spectral Passage (1975), and commissions three new works by Asian artists reimagined for the presentation. The exhibition remains on view through January 18, 2026.

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