Call for participants: RAM assembles 2025 Shanghai Picnic 

Rockbund Art Museum appoints Bangkok-based all(zone) as Artistic Director.

The 2025 edition of RAM assembles (RAMa) curated by all(zone) architects led by Rachaporn Choochuey, addresses the complexities of modern life in Asian cities. Their theme Shanghai Picnic envisions a flexible, open-ended framework that reactivates underused urban spaces through conviviality, creativity, and ecological awareness. By introducing light and reusable built structures and adaptive programs, it invites Shanghai’s citizens and visitors to redefine how urban space can be experienced—often in improvisational ways architects and designers have not predicted. At its core, a picnic is about choice: people decide where to sit, what tools and utensils to use, what food to bring or buy, and how they engage. This openness transforms the city into a shared canvas, or picnic blanket, where spontaneous interactions, collective imagination, and activities become integral to the space itself. The interplay between the designed and the improvised reveals new ways of occupying the urban fabric, suggesting a more fluid, responsive approach to public space—one that values adaptation over permanence. Picnics create a sense of agency, enabling people to reclaim their surroundings, make the space their own, and realize the festival’s vision through their presence, actions, and choices—fleeting yet meaningful. 

Curatorial statement from all(zone) architects 
The word “assemble” in RAM assembles resonates with us. It’s a call to action—urgent, time-bound, and full of energy. It speaks of community, of coming together, and, most importantly, it sounds like fun.

Shanghai, a fascinating metropolis, is changing at breakneck speed. Once-bustling neighborhoods, alive with daily rituals, are disappearing beneath waves of glass towers and sterile corridors. Public spaces, meant for gathering, often feel cold and unwelcoming. But a city is more than its buildings—it is the people, the energy, the unplanned moments that give it life.

So, what if we took it back? What if architecture could rekindle the joy of living together? What if we could transform these sterile spaces into vibrant playgrounds—spontaneous yet harmonious, full of life but never chaotic? A city that breathes, moves, and evolves—where structure and spontaneity coexist in balance.

We see ROCKBUND as a site of experimentation, a place to test these ideas in real-time. It’s where we come together to explore, create, and redefine what living in urban space can be.

—Rachaporn Choochuey, co-founder, all(zone) architects, Bangkok

Call for participants
RAM assembles: Shanghai Picnic invites proposals from Asia-based creative collectives to develop programs, objects, props, tools, and site-specific interventions that unfold across the ROCKBUND neighborhood. Taking place daily—both day and night—each event will center around a distinct theme, creating a dynamic festival of exchange and encounter.

Curated by all(zone), this open call seeks to explore the challenges and possibilities of urban inhabitation across Asia and Southeast Asia. We welcome proposals that engage with themes of food, community rituals, performative arts, ecological design, sustainability, and collaborative storytelling, embracing the adaptable, convivial, and spontaneous spirit of a picnic.

Selected interventions should activate the spatial qualities of the ROCKBUND area while addressing practical, sustainable, and ecological concerns. As many of these locations adjoin recently restored historical buildings, proposed light structures and installations must be sensitive to their architectural context, ensuring minimal impact on the built environment.

Site-specific installations and programs
Each Alley presents a distinct spatial quality and potential for intervention: Alley 1–A Forgotten Loggia / Alley 2–A Place to stay and stare / Alley 3–A Narrow Sky / Alley 4–An open Foyer

Design considerations
The four alleys serve as an introduction to the entire festival and lead visitors toward RAM Plaza, creating a cohesive spatial and experiential journey. The site will operate daily between 10am and 10pm. Proposals should creatively activate the space through programmatic interventions, while addressing practical, sustainable, and ecological concerns. As these spaces are adjacent to recently restored historical buildings, proposed light structures and installations must be sensitive to their architectural context, ensuring minimal impact on the built environment.

Proposal requirements
Submissions must include:
–A 500-word concept statement explaining the vision behind the project.
–A detailed outline of the program, activities, and physical intervention, including visualizations and specifications (if applicable).
–A fact sheet with key information about the structure.
–A budget estimate and allocation breakdown.
–CVs of the collective and all individuals involved.
–The proposal must be submitted as a single PDF (A3 landscape format, max. 20MB). 

Jury: X Zhu-Nowell, Executive Director & Chief Curator, Rockbund Art Museum / Rachaporn Choochuey, Co-founder, all(zone) / Chen Yun, Project Manager, RAM assembles / Joni Zhu, Head of Public Programs and Research, Rockbund Art Museum / Jessica Yan, Event Planning Manager, ROCKBUND

Submission deadline: March 30, 2025, at 6pm GMT+8. Submit proposals via email to hr@rockbundartmuseum.org

About all(zone)
all(zone), co-founded by Rachaporn Choochuey, is a Bangkok-based studio exploring light, adaptive architecture for climate-unstable conditions, especially in tropical settings. For them, all architecture is temporary, varying in timespan, leading them to work across both conventional construction and the festival context. Their projects and exhibitions span global venues such as MPavilion, the Guggenheim, Vitra Design Museum, Sharjah Architecture Triennial, Diriyah Contemporary Art Biennale, and the Venice Biennale of Architecture 2025.

About RAM assembles (RAMa)
RAM assembles—a biennial festival of architectural thinking organized by the Rockbund Art Museum—was launched in 2023 to celebrate the completion of the ROCKBUND construction project and the opening of the museum’s new entrance and Museum Plaza. Conceived and led by the museum’s Executive Director and Chief Curator, X Zhu-Nowell, this initiative explores architecture’s evolving role in shaping public space.

For each edition, the RAM team, under Zhu-Nowell’s leadership, invites an architect to serve as Artistic Director, tasked with developing a new architectural intervention in the ROCKBUND neighborhood, with a particular focus on the Museum Plaza. In addition to this spatial intervention, the Artistic Director curates a series of public programs and events that activate the broader ROCKBUND neighborhood. The inaugural Artistic Director was British architect David Chipperfield, whose 18-year restoration and redevelopment of the historic ROCKBUND site laid the foundation for this ongoing dialogue.

RAM assembles brings together diverse perspectives on both historical and new architecture thinking, engaging disciplines across urbanism, public space, art, and design to foster new ways of thinking about the built environment in Asia.