Youn Bum-mo, curator and professor at Dongguk University, has been appointed the new director of the National Museum of Modern and Contemporary Art in Korea, the Ministry of Culture, Sports and Tourism announced Thursday. According to the announcement, Youn will start his three-year term on Feb. 1, filling the post that has been vacant since Dec. 13, when Bartomeu Mari was let go after his term as director. Curator Youn Bum-mo (Courtesy of the curator)The central government started its recruitme

Kukje Gallery on Tuesday began a solo exhibition of painter Min Joung-ki, a local artist who regained attention after South Korean President Moon Jae-in and North Korean leader Kim Jong-un posed for pictures in front of his painting “Mount Bukhan” during their summit in April last year.  North Korean leader Kim Jong-un and South Korean President Moon Jae-in shake hands in front of Min Joun-ki’s landscape painting “Mount Bukhan” in the Peach House at Panmunjom during the inter-Korean summit in Ap

Hyundai Motor, South Korea’s leading carmaker, announced Friday that it would provide financial support for Tate’s new research center dedicated to promoting non-Western art.Starting in January, the Hyundai Motor-supported research platform will foster arts research and art acquisitions with a focus on regions other than the so-called Western countries. The program will run for six years. (Hyundai Motor)Lee Sook-kyung, former senior curator at Tate Research Centre: Asia, will head the program. F

Doosan Gallery is holding an exhibition curated by participants of its eighth Doosan Curator Workshop -- Yoo Eun-soon , Yu Ji-won and Lee Jin. The exhibition “YourSearch, On-demand Research Service” by the three curators introduces 23 works by Ghim Da-hwan Lee Dong-geun, Kim Woong-hyun, Lee Yoon-seo and Jung Eu-gene.An installation view of Doosan Gallery’s exhibition “YourSearch, On-demand Research Service” (Doosan Gallery)The exhibition touts itself as a research service platform designed to pr

Speaking at his first Seoul exhibition, 'photograffeur' talks about how his work interacts with public, upcoming installation in Paris

Korean artists Kwon Ha-youn and Jin Si-yon have installed their media artworks at a pavilion outside the Times Square building in Causeway Bay, Hong Kong.Under the title of “Lunar Fantasy with Ancient Auspicious Animals,” the two Korean artists have presented their own digital renderings of eight mythical creatures from the Chinese tradition of Feng Shui, which are believed to bring luck, prosperity and wealth.  A pavillion in front of Times Square building in Causeway Bay, Hong Kong (Gana Art)“

The National Museum of Modern and Contemporary Art on Wednesday announced its exhibition schedule for 2019. Park Wi-jin, managing director and acting director of the MMCA, announced the museum’s calendar for this year, as the director post remains vacant. Twenty-three exhibitions will be held between the network of four art museums, which now includes the recently opened Cheongju branch. Some 10 billion won ($8.9 million) of the total annual budget of 63.2 billion won, a 4 percent increase from

Artist Kim Joon has been selected as the winner of the 18th SongEun Art Award, SongEun Art and Cultural Foundation announced Friday.Kim has been focusing on introducing installations that present sounds and photographs he collected on-site. Through his site-specific soundscape project, Kim has been attempting to explore the history of locations and to make landscapes audible. The artist is best known for his work delving into the ecology of Nanji, a landfill-turned-park in Seoul. Kim gradua

Christie’s has defended itself in regards to claims that it sold a Korean gallery’s painting for less than it was worth as part of a sweetheart deal, saying it acted to settle a loan it had made reasonable efforts to settle. Korean gallery One and J filed on Jan. 2 for a preliminary injunction with the New York County Supreme Court over the former’s sale of a painting by Francis Bacon in a private deal at what the Korean gallery claimed was a “bargain price.”The two parties had remained silent s

French artist Xavier Veilhan is holding a solo exhibition at 313 Art Project’s newly opened branch in Seongbuk-dong, as well as the gallery’s Cheongdam space. Veilhan rose to international acclaim with his 2009 exhibition at Versailles, and participated in the French Pavilion at the 2017 Venice Biennale.Xavier Veilhan speaks at a press conference held at 313 Art Project's newly opened gallery in Seongbuk-dong on Thursday. On the backdrop is one of his "Ghost Landscapes." (313 Art Project)In Kore

Roh Seung-bok’s pigment prints titled “1366 Project” are lined up on the wall. The warm toned prints that employ red, purple and pink are abstract at first sight. In fact, the prints are close-up images of bruises of female victims of domestic violence, and 1366 is the phone number of the domestic violence hotline.The print is one of some 60 works by 11 women artists on show at the Seoul National University Museum of Art exhibition featuring their takes on the lives of women in Korea.　“Pale Nigh

Architect Seung Hyo-sang believes in power of architecture to bring happiness

The National Museum of Modern and Contemporary Art has opened its fourth branch in Cheongju, North Chungcheong Province, following the Gwacheon branch that opened in 1986, the Deoksugung branch in 1998 and the Seoul branch in 2013. The Cheongju branch is housed in a five-story building that was a tobacco factory built in 1946. The factory produced an annual average of some 10 billion cigarettes until it ceased operations in 2004. The National Museum of Modern and Contemporary Art’s fourth branch

Art critic Arthur Danto once said, “Duchamp did not merely raise the question ‘What is Art?’ but rather ‘Why is something a work of art when something exactly like it is not?’”The paradigm shift that Duchamp introduced to the art world with his “readymade” objects -- that an everyday object with little or no modification could become a work of art through the creative process by the artist and spectator -- was a concept that shattered the modern conception of art as the production of artistic “g

SongEun Art Foundation hosts exhibition featuring four candidates for 18th SongEun Art Award