Travel with Art, Culture & Architecture

There is a particular kind of book that earns its place not by volume or bravado, but by the way it subtly recalibrates how you move through the world once you have closed it. The 99 Modern and Contemporary Art Centers belongs firmly in this category. It is not a guide in the conventional sense, nor does it indulge in the performative certainty that clings to much cultural travel publishing. Instead, it unfolds with restraint, allowing art, architecture and place to surface on their own terms.

Edited by Marcella Ciacci, the book brings together 99 modern and contemporary art centres from 42 countries, shaped by the collective intelligence of 155 contributors from 41 nations. There are five extended conversations woven through its pages, alongside a dedicated focus on art and architecture, giving space to curators, architects and thinkers without tipping into didacticism. Published in both English and Spanish, and produced with the support of Fondation d’Entreprise Hermès, it carries the weight of a serious object while remaining disarmingly approachable. As Ciacci reflects, “writing about ninety-nine art centres was both a challenge and a privilege. Each one demanded a different way of seeing and writing, yet all shared a sense of purpose and beauty.” That sense of purpose is what quietly binds the book together.

Moving through its pages feels closer to travelling than planning to travel. One moment you are navigating the theatrical subterranean world of MONA, where provocation, architecture and landscape collide with unapologetic confidence. Next, you are immersed in the Alpine restraint of La Congiunta, a place where concrete becomes contemplative, and silence operates as a curatorial instrument rather than an absence. From there, the journey might carry you to the sun-bleached edges of Marfa, where distance sharpens perception, before arriving at the grounded clarity of SCCA Tamale, where art is inseparable from education, community and lived experience.

What distinguishes The 99 is its insistence that contemporary art does not exist in isolation from architecture, geography or daily life. Conversations with figures such as Hans Ulrich Obrist and Vicente Todolí avoid grandstanding in favour of reflection, while architectural voices including Frida Escobedo, Bjarke Ingels and Ma Yansong speak to listening as much as designing. The writing by Ianko Lopez moves through fragments, clues and anecdotes. What began, in his words, as a demanding task became “a creative journey in its own right,” and that sense of discovery remains palpable throughout.

Running beneath it all is a simple but quietly radical idea, articulated by Ciacci with characteristic clarity: “This isn’t about travel. It’s about transformation.” The book positions itself not as a checklist or an authority, but as a way of moving through the world, attentive to the fact that art can appear far from expected centres, sometimes across oceans, sometimes just down the street.

For travellers and readers drawn to architecture, to the slower rhythms of place and to art that feels embedded rather than imposed, The 99 offers something increasingly rare: a way of looking that values attention over acceleration. It does not dictate where you should go next. It sharpens your vision when you arrive and leaves the rest deliberately unresolved.

ORDER your copy in either English or Spanish: The 99 Modern and Contemporary Art Centers.

Published in both English and Spanish, and produced with the support of Fondation d’Entreprise Hermès, it carries the weight of a serious object while remaining disarmingly approachable