Ahead of Frieze Seoul kicking off on Wednesday, Seoul is in a festive mood with numerous art exhibitions and events taking place at museums, galleries and auction houses around the city. In a two-part series, The Korea Herald offers a roundup of selected events in the city -- in southern and northern parts of the capital. The following piece is the second in the series. -- Ed.
Amorepacific Museum of Art
Amorepacific Museum of Art in Yongsan-gu has become a key destination for Seoul Art Week this year with two exhibitions that should not be missed. Berlin-based artistic duo Elmgreen & Dragget’s most extensive exhibition in Asia to date, “Elmgreen & Dragset: Spaces” presents more than 60 works with five immersive installations, such as a full-scale family house, a public pool, a restaurant with an adjacent kitchen, and an artist's studio.
“We like to transform the museum spaces so that they are almost not recognizable as museum spaces anymore. In that way, we believe that the audiences will experience the artworks in a different manner,” Michael Elmgreen said at the press tour on Friday.
Gagosian’s inaugural exhibition in Seoul takes place in the same building, Amorepacific's headquarters building, with American artist Derrick Adams's debut exhibition “Derrick Adams: The Strip." The exhibition features the artist’s latest painting series, which depicts display windows at beauty supply stores photographed by the artist near his Brooklyn studio and throughout the world.
The “Derrick Adams: The Strip” and “Elmgreen & Dragset: Spaces” exhibitions run through Oct. 12 and Feb. 23, 2025, respectively.
Samcheong-dong
As an old art cluster in Seoul, Samcheong-dong neighborhood has numerous exhibitions that coincide with Seoul Art Week, running Monday through Sunday. The National Museum of Modern and Contemporary Art, Korea on Wednesday unveils a group exhibition of Asian female artists, “Connecting Bodies – Asian Women Artists.” The show is centered around works that reveal experiences of cultural otherness by Asian women artists since the 1960s.
Behind MMCA Seoul is Art Sonje Center, where Korean contemporary art master Suh Do-ho’s solo exhibition “Do Ho Suh: Speculations” is taking place. The exhibition presents themes explored by Suh over the past 20 years under the overarching concept of “speculation.”
As an artist constantly on the move between Seoul, New York and London, Suh showcases “Bridge Project,” which was triggered by the question “What or where is a perfect home?” The exhibition runs until Nov. 3.
Galleries have also unveiled quality exhibitions to attract collectors and visitors during the art week. Gallery Hyundai sheds light on Korean-born artist John Pai, presenting a comprehensive overview of the artist’s 70-year career. Starting with Pai's early steel sculptures of the early 1960s, it introduces around 40 works, including welded steel sculptures, drawings, and paintings representing each era of Pai’s oeuvre.
Kukje Gallery is showing two exhibitions: “Phantom and A Map” by Korean artist Ham Kyung-ah, featuring her iconic “Embroidery Project” series started in 2008; and “Soft Skills and Underground Whispers” by Michael Joo, which includes the artist’s new installation works.
Hakgojae Gallery’s exhibition “I Thought I Lost It!,” featuring artists from South Korea, Japan and China -- Oum Jeong-soon, Shiota Chiharu and Ding Yi -- examines how art and architecture can contribute to the social consensus to create resilient social communities.
Barakat Contemporary presents the first solo exhibition of Jordanian artist Lawrence Abu Hamdan who describes himself as a “Private Ear” using sound to shape his artistic practice, according to the gallery.
On the street behind these galleries is Songwon Art Center, where Philips Auction is hosting an exhibition entitled “Azure Horizons: A Journey Through Blue” to coincide with Frieze Seoul. The exhibition features works by Nicolas Party, George Condo and Flora Yukhnovich.
Media artist Refik Anadol’s first solo exhibition in Asia is another must-see exhibition. Titled “Echoes of the Earth: Living Archive,” the exhibition at the newly opened Futura Seoul introduces Anadol’s pioneering media work based on data and machine intelligence.
Hannam-dong, Hoam Art Museum
An art mecca for Seoul's hipsters, Hannam-dong is another art destination. Leeum Museum of Art will show two exhibitions starting Thursday -- “Anicka Yi, There Exists Another Evolution, But In This One” and “2024 Art Spectrum Dream Screen.”
As an artist who merges technology and biology in her art, Yi has employed organic and ephemeral materials, such as bacteria, scent and tempura-fried flowers, to capture the nuances of human emotion and sensation.
Among the featured works is Yi’s new video work “Each Branch of Coral Holds Up the Light of the Moon,” where the artist grapples with the question of whether art can continue beyond the artist's biological death.
At Pace Gallery, a stone's throw away from Leeum, the exhibition “Correspondence” opens Wednesday, bringing together works by Lee U-fan and Mark Rothko. Across the street on Hannam-daero is Thaddaeus Ropac which is showing two exhibitions: “Soul” featuring a selection of new paintings by Irish-born Sean Scull and “Adler Barfus” that shows a new series of paintings and ink drawings by Georg Baselitz.
Gallery Shilla’s newly opened space in Itaewon will show the works of Korea’s pioneering installation artist Kim Young-jin, in her first Seoul solo exhibition, starting Tuesday. The exhibition follows a group exhibition of Korean experimental art that toured MMCA Seoul and New York's Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum last year.
Outside Seoul, Hoam Art Museum in Yongin, Gyeonggi Province, run by the Samsung Foundation of Culture, is presenting the solo exhibition “Nicolas Party: Dust,” featuring five of Party's new pastel murals and paintings, inspired by traditional Korean artifacts and the art collection of Leeum Museum of Art.
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