In his latest exhibition, Schreiben (a Korean artist despite the name) introduces the viewer to Seoulian-Beast, a person born in Korea's countrysie who moves to Seoul to pursue "the average". The artist refers to a section of Korean society that believes that the only way to survive is to adjust yourself to the 'average'. A stinging look of criticism is given to those who do not live an 'average' life in Korean society i.e those who do not pursue professional/career/corporate/material success. This competitiveness is the only way to survive and, according to the artist, turns people into Seoul-Beasts. At its core, this is a criticism of capitalism applied to a Confuscian society rather than a criticism of authentic Korean values.
Lee Hee Young's latest show explores the interconnectedness of everything - the insides of human life, nature and the universe. It is an invitation to look withing and pay proper attention to the emotions we feel, the thoughts we think and the way we live. The endless flow of thoughts and feelings underscore the confrontation between ideal and reality, past and present. The artist suggest that we do not always easily recognise each emotion and invites us to spend some time in contemplation and reflection on the mixture/ball of emotions within. The lack of solid shapes and forms on the canvas indicates the universe's constant state of change.
The Seoul Museum of History is holding a special exhibition on the work and life of women from various classes, from queens who worked in and around the Hanyang City Wall in the Joseon Dynasty, to court ladies, and shamans. The exhibition is divided into three parts according to the space of activity of women in Hanyang, and consists of 'Part 1, Without the Gate', 'Part 2, Within the City Wall', and 'Part 3, Outside the City Wall, Wishing'.
"Without the Gate" examines the changes in women's status and household management over time. Major relics include 'Kyumunsuji Travel Map', a kind of board game made for the education of women while Queen Inhyeon was deposed and staying at her parents' house.
"Within the Gate" explores the lives of women, who accounted for half of the population of Hanyang (the old name of Seoul, the capital of the Joseon period), and worked in visible and invisible roles, supporting and keeping Hanyang moving. These include servants, wellbeing professionals, entertainers, craftswomen and merchants, sewers.
The last part of the show focuses on shamans and other religios rituals that were believed to have magical powers to help women and make their dreams come true.
Park Young Yul's works are unconscious shapes projected into the real world. Art is seen as a medium for expression of the subconsious mind and an attempt to make sense of a world of consiousness which has lost its focus. Human life passes at the intersection of consiousness and unconsciousness and is a result of its interplay.
Kim Dea Sung's "An Imaginary Space" presentes the viewer with "painting-scuptures" that capture both 2D and 3D reality and explore the relationship between form and colour.
"Paranormal Festa" by Yoon Seo Young invites us in a world of longing. Human hopes and dreams, the imaginary worlds that we all live in at least to some extent in our heads often are un-realise-able in external reality. But art can provide a solution to this - in art, on the canvas, all is possible. The main characters of the canvas are sirens, creatures of Greek mythology reputed to have magical powers, that invite the audience to reconnect with its primal human-ness, at risk of disappearing in today's modern society.
Th exhibition "A Star Without a Name" by Dabin Kim and Wookyung Kim, (winners of the '2023 SHINHAN YOUNG ARTIST FESTA' group contest) explored the emotions that arise in us in the course of our daily life that at first are hard to understand, decypher, comprehand and grapple with. Things that are unclear and ambiguous but definately there, living in our subconsious until we find the right words to describe it. The quiet and subdued notions that are not the big explosive feeling we can easily see. Fast-paced lives flood our minds with these kinds of under-the-surface emotions that only quiet contemplation and meditation can help us resolve. This is the nameless star/feeling that we are invited to think about with the title of the show.
The Pohang Museum of Art presents "Concrete Romance", an exhibition by Hyekyung Son, winner of the 18th Jang Doogeon Art Prize, explores Marx's critical theory of capitalism. The artist captures the difference in the value of something and its price that powers the capitalist system. In the midst of this realisation, the artist entertains the romantic dream of art having the power to change society by reminding people of their core human nature and highlighting how modernity is alienating them from it.
Artist Go Min Ji introduces us to 'Dokheukri', an imaginary chicken-dragon animal which lives over 3,000 years as a mysterious being with the shamanistic ability to predict the future and make humans see illusions. This animal, floating in an unrealistic space, imagining and enjoying the universe it itself created, longs for universal truth but cannot reach it due to its mortality. As we are trapped in day-to-day life, we wish for eternity that is eternally out of reach. Ultimately, the exhibition is a confession that we need spirituality, dreams, magic, myth in our lives if we are to stay connected to our roots and stay true to our human nature.