New exhibition sheds light on Korea’s most exciting artists and galleries

The Korea Arts Management Service (KAMS) and the Ministry of Culture, Sports and Tourism have come together to organise an exhibition of some of the country’s most promising galleries and artists. Returning in 2023 for its fourth instalment of the Special Exhibition of Outstanding Galleries — this time titled Dialogue: Mind Map — the exhibition forms part of the Grant for Artist Management programme that is run by KAMS, and through which support is offered to visual artists around the country, and a strong global network established for some of its many galleries.

This year 13 artists and 13 galleries will exhibit their works, each of which have been curated by Lee Daehyung, the artistic director of Dialogue: Mind Map. Lee, who is known for his involvement with the Korean Pavilion at the Venice Biennale, is also the director of Hzone, a “curating company connecting art, technology and the future”, as stated in a press release. The featured artists include Byun Sang Hwan, Choi Euncheol, Choi Hyesook, Jeong Zik Seong, Jo Jong Sung, Kim Gemini, Lee Fi Jae, Lee Jungmin, Min SungHong, Park Ju Ae, Rhee Donghoon, Shin Junmin and Yang Jung Hwa.

Speaking on this latest instalment, Lee says Dialogue: Mind Map is more than just an exhibition — “it is a vibrant symposium, an invitation to engage in stimulating dialogues about the transformative role of art and artists in our rapidly evolving society”. He goes on: “It urges us to redirect our gaze from the commercial value of art to the fertile reservoir of ideas that underpin artistic creation, thereby reasserting the timeless truth that the essence of art lies in its ability to stimulate introspection, evoke emotions and foster a sense of shared human experience.”

However, financial viability remains important for artists and institutions alike, and with Korean art making up just 0.5 per cent of art market sales worldwide (which currently total more than $60 billion), it’s crucial that a global platform is given to its art scene. In an interview with The Korea Times in 2021, Yoo Jin-sang, the curator of a previous edition of the exhibition, noted this statistic, stating “the number of artists, or graduating art students, are continuously increasing, but their works cannot all be consumed within Korea. So they have to target international audiences.”

Lee has selected nine other well-known curators to help with creating the publication for Dialogue: Mind Map. Each of these curators has entered into conversation with the 13 featured artists and these interviews will become the basis for various insightful critical texts. The curators include Vennes Cheng (M+ Museum), Annette Doms (ICAA), Adrian George (ArtScience Museum), Tony Guillan (Artangel), independent curator Bartomeu Mari, Vytautas Michelkevičius (Nida Art Colony), Filipa Ramos (Art Basel Film), Nadim Samman (KW Institute for Contemporary Art) and Kay Watson (Serpentine). Meanwhile, Lee himself interviewed directors of the 13 featured galleries in order to “shed light on their visions and philosophies and discuss future strategies to strengthen global competitiveness”.

Included in these strategies is a plan to maintain this exhibition as a yearly occurrence, and to continue to feature new waves of emerging artists working in Korean contemporary art. Commenting on this, Moon Young-ho, president of KAMS, notes: “It is the era of the first trillion won in the Korean art market. In the future, we will continue to promote various projects so that the next generation of Korean artists can be actively promoted at home and abroad.”

Dialogue: Mind Map will be on show between 25 August and 9 September at Plantlance Seongsu in Seoul. For more information regarding the exhibition, head over to the KAMS Instagram account.