Museum MACAN, a private museum in Jakarta which has a collection of modern and contemporary art from Indonesia and beyond it, has announced today that its inaugural director Aaron Seeto will leave his post next month. Seeto came to Macan from the Queensland Art Gallery | Gallery of Modern Art in Brisbane, Australia, where he was curatorial manager of Asian and Pacific art and also led the curatorial team responsible for the 8th Asia Pacific Triennial of Contemporary Art. At MACAN, he has presented exhibitions by artists including Xu Bing, Yayoi Kusama and Lee Mingwei.
‘I’ve had an extraordinary seven years with MACAN,’ said Seeto in a press announcement, adding, ‘it’s a rare opportunity to realise a new museum in a vibrant art scene that did not have an institutional player before. In that way, it was up to our creative vision to chart the course of what kind of role MACAN would take in Indonesia, and how we could encourage important artistic dialogues between our region and the rest of the world.’ Seeto will step down on 31 January 2024 to focus on the next chapter in his career beyond Asia. The current chairwoman of the Museum MACAN Foundation Fenessa Adikoesoemo will take on the role of chief spokesperson for MACAN while the board begins a search for a new director.
