Recently, the Korean art scene has been embroiled in a heated debate over the potential establishment of a branch of the iconic Centre National d'Art et de Culture Georges-Pompidou (Pompidou Center) in Korea.
2024.10.22
Last week, we reflected on the 30-year history of the Gwangju Biennale and its achievements. This week, we will discuss the current state of various biennales actively held across Korea, their challenges, and the direction they need to take moving forward, alongside the Gwangju Biennale.
2024.09.24
The hot topic this year is the 30th anniversary of the Gwangju Biennale. To commemorate this, we will take a look at its achievements, divided into two parts. In Part 1, we will briefly review the history and accomplishments of the Gwangju Biennale, and in Part 2, we will examine the challenges it faces and its future prospects.
2024.09.17
In this final article of the series, we will discuss the essential conditions for the success of Korean art fairs and the absolute necessity of global expansion. Additionally, we will briefly examine the operational status of KIAF and Frieze Seoul over the past three years and explore the underlying realities of the so-called "era of 100 art fairs" in Korea.
2024.09.10
The news in 2022 that Frieze, a globally prestigious art fair, would be held in Seoul for the first time was both a breath of fresh air and a cause for concern within the Korean art world. On the one hand, it was a positive sign that Korea was being recognized for its potential as a hub in the Asian art market. On the other hand, there were worries that Korea's relatively underdeveloped art market could be overshadowed by Western art fairs backed by massive capital.
2024.09.03
September's hot topic revolves around the joint hosting of the Kiaf and Frieze art fairs, providing a perfect backdrop to discuss the recent art fair boom sweeping through South Korea's art scene, which we'll explore in a three-part series.
2024.08.27
Moving beyond Orientalism entails more than shifting the center from the West to Asia. It requires transforming the structure through which particular actors have classified and evaluated the art of other regions, while developing new values and criteria grounded in diverse histories and experiences. What is needed is a new system of knowledge—one that recognizes the achievements of Western art history as a shared global legacy without treating them as the sole standard of judgment.
2026.09.08
BTS emerged in Korea and developed within the cultural and industrial framework of K-pop. Yet the market in which its music is produced and consumed, as well as its audience and influence, moved beyond Korea’s geographical boundaries long ago.
2026.08.25
“Asian contemporary art” does not refer to a single shared style or aesthetic. Korea, China, Japan, and the countries of Southeast Asia each have distinct histories, political and social conditions, art institutions, and markets.
2026.08.11
The Anachronism series began by examining how Korean art has continued to understand and organize itself under changing conditions through languages, institutions, and models of success inherited from the past. It considered the recurring tendency to reproduce earlier
2026.07.28
A fundamental problem in Korean art history remains insufficiently resolved: the criteria by which its historical periods are distinguished. When did Korea’s modern period in art begin? What does hyeondae misul—the category conventionally called “modern art” or “contemporary art” in Korean—actually signify, and where does it begin? And from what
2026.07.14
The previous two essays examined the anachronism of Korean contemporary art. The first identified the problem of explaining the present through the languages of the past. The second examined the structure through which past models of success continue to be repeated as strategies for the future.
2026.06.30
