Museum of Art & Photography lands at Bengaluru Airport’s Terminal 2: A first-of-its-kind art experience for travellers

In most airports, time is something to be endured. But in Bengaluru, it's being reimagined through art. In a first-of-its-kind initiative in India, the Museum of Art & Photography (MAP), Bengaluru, has partnered with Kempegowda International Airport to transform travel into a cultural experience. Now, as you wait to board a flight, you can engage with art not in hushed white-walled galleries, but in departure lounges and terminals.

Bengaluru Airport just got a museum — and you don’t need a ticket to explore it

The Domestic Terminal is where a world of South Asian art and culture reveals itself in unexpected, tech-driven ways. The Gallery on Demand offers a deeply curated dive into MAP’s rich collection. With a swipe or a tap, you’re transported into the colourful and complex worlds of artists such as Jamini Roy, Jangarh Singh Shyam, Jyoti Bhatt, Suresh Punjabi and LN Tallur. Each digital exhibition is a window into India’s layered visual legacy, brought to life on sleek screens scattered across the space.

But this isn’t your typical passive museum encounter. The Gallery on Demand also weaves in cinematic threads from MAP’s vast film ephemera archive — posters, lobby cards and stills that map the evolution of Indian cinema. Here, you can trace the fascinating journey of the tawaif in Bollywood, drift through tales of Arabian Nights, or watch short films that explore the lives and works of celebrated artists featured in the museum’s collection.

Interactive Digitial Artworks

For those travelling with children — or simply the young at heart — there’s tactile engagement too. Interactive puzzles, touch-based and inviting, reinterpret classic Indian works of art. Imagine piecing together SH Raza’s swirling Universe, Jamini Roy’s iconic Last Supper or NS Bendre’s vibrant The Lotus Sellers. Each puzzle deepens your appreciation for the brushstrokes, symbolism, and stories embedded in these paintings.

In a nod to tradition, MAP has introduced Digital Lamp Lighting — a warm, symbolic activity reimagined for the digital age. Lighting a lamp has always marked an auspicious beginning in Indian culture. Now, through an elegant digital interface, passengers can select a traditional lamp from the museum’s digitised collection, personalise it with their name and light it virtually. 

Section of the International Terminal

Over at the International Terminal, passengers in transit can engage with all the above features — but also something more. A dedicated exhibition titled Bhuri Bai: My Life as an Artist offers a rare glimpse into the life and evolving practice of padma shri Bhuri Bai, a painter, muralist and illustrator who broke barriers with her art.

The exhibition unfolds in three poignant segments: the first, an autobiographical selection from a series commissioned by MAP in 2018; the second, a timeline of her rise as an artist beginning in the 1980s following her pivotal encounter with Jagdish Swaminathan; and the third, a compelling display of works from MAP’s collection, featuring early pieces from the ’80s and ’90s alongside recent large-scale commissions. Originally showcased at TRI Art & Culture in Kolkata in late 2024, the exhibition now finds a new audience in the most unlikely of places — an international airport terminal.

Portable Gallery

In blending heritage with high-tech, stillness with movement, MAP and Kempegowda International Airport have created more than a showcase — they’ve reimagined what cultural access can look like. Here, art isn’t just something you look at. It’s something you travel through.

The experience doesn’t stop there. Through Cumulus, MAP’s digital collection app, passengers can dive even deeper — searching for specific artefacts, exploring artworks in granular detail and even curating their own virtual collection. This platform isn’t just a browsing tool — it’s a research assistant, a personal archive and a portable gallery, all rolled into one. Feeling inspired? Take the experience home. A thoughtfully curated selection of home and lifestyle products — each one inspired by pieces in MAP’s collection — awaits you at the MAP store, a souvenir for every art lover.

Entry free