Sook-kyung Lee, director of the Whitworth Museum in England (left), and Hae-joo Kim, senior curator at the Singapore Art Museum. Last year, one of the most notable phenomena in the global art world was the ‘progress of Korean artists.’ Overseas ‘big names’ who visited Frieze Seoul, a global art fair (art market) held in Seoul last September, swept up works by Korean artists, and world-renowned art museums such as the Guggenheim Metropolitan rushed to hold exhibitions by Korean artists.
Artists are not the only protagonists of the budding ‘K Art’. The value of Korean curators has risen as much as that of artists. The national pavilion to be installed at the world’s largest art festival, the 60th Venice Biennale, which opens in April this year, is being entrusted to a Korean curator. Not one, but two countries.
The main characters are Lee Sook-kyung (54, Japan Pavilion), director of the Whitworth Museum in England, and Kim Hae-ju, senior curator at the Singapore Art Museum (SAM) (43, Singapore Pavilion). The theme of this year’s Biennale is ‘Foreigners Everywhere.’ How do these people, living as strangers in a strange land, express this theme in the exhibition? We met those who are at the forefront of K-Art.
○“A huge problem for humanity, we will solve it kindly”
It was Director Lee who first announced the news that Koreans would be in charge of exhibitions at overseas national pavilions. This is the first time in 70 years since Japan established the national pavilion at the Venice Biennale that a foreigner has been appointed as the curator. When I asked Director Lee, who recently visited Korea, what he thought, he told me this story with a cheerful smile. He said, “Someone told me that. ‘Korea’s representative export product’. haha. “I would appreciate it if you saw it that way.”
He became a ‘Korean export’ about 30 years ago. He became the first Asian curator to become a curator at Tate Modern, a world-class art museum, and the first Korean to serve as director of the University of Whitworth Art Museum in Manchester, England. In this way, ‘first’ became a modifier always attached to his name. Having promoted Korean art in an unfamiliar land for a long time and breaking through the conservative Japanese art world, what does he think about the subject of ‘stranger’?
“The moment this year’s theme (Stranger) was announced, I thought, ‘This is my story.’ So, in this exhibition, along with the theme of strangers, I will try to solve the climate crisis issue that Yuko Mori has dealt with through personal experience. “It’s more interesting and can elicit empathy to tell personal experiences rather than talking about abstract things.”
The collaboration partner for this Biennale is Japanese installation artist Yuko Mori. At last year’s Gwangju Biennale, which Director Lee served as general director, novelist Han Kang <흰>(2016), the artist created a wave shape with white paper after being inspired by it. Director Lee said, “Yuko is an artist who shows huge human problems through technology, sound, kinetic art, etc.” and added, “We will present the story Yuko is trying to tell in an authentic way while also creating a friendly exhibition that the audience can empathize with.”
○ “I will become a curator who conveys context”
Singapore, which is competing with Seoul to become the ‘second Asian art capital’ after Hong Kong, also entrusted the planning of the national pavilion exhibition to a Korean (curator Kim Hae-joo) for the first time. I received this request right after moving to Singapore in February last year after serving as deputy director of the Artsonje Center and director of the Busan Biennale. It is said that Robert Zhao Renhui, the representative writer of the Singapore Pavilion, picked him.
“When I took charge of directing the Busan Biennale, I planned it in a way that intertwined the city’s history, topography, and environment with the art exhibition. I think that’s why writer Zhao Renhui, who has explored the relationship between humans and non-humans, chose me. I am a writer who has been researching the topic of ‘secondary forests’ (forests that are not primeval forests but developed secondary due to human interference, etc.) for seven years. “To fully understand his vast world of works, I personally visited the forests featured in his works and studied the animals and plants.”
Curator Kim said that the artist’s treatment of ‘secondary forests’ is connected to the Biennale’s theme, ‘Strangers’. “The secondary forest that the author deals with can be called a ‘border space.’ Things that have been pushed out of their original places, such as trash thrown away by people and exotic plants and animals brought in from outside, coexist. I think Zhao Renhui’s work is in line with the larger theme in that it represents the ‘existence of boundaries’, which has not received much attention until now. “In order to better convey this topic to visitors, we plan to decorate the exhibition with video media and installation work.”
He is also a stranger living in Singapore. He said, “After living abroad, I realized how limited what I knew until now was everything from food to art,” and added, “I will strive to become a curator who can interpret and convey works well in cultural and social context.”
Reporter Seon-ah Lee suna@hankyung.com
