The Met Fifth Avenue. ©The Metropolitan Museum of Art

Starting in November, approximately 30 works of Korean modern and contemporary art, including the Lee Kun-hee Collection, pieces from the National Museum of Modern and Contemporary Art, and the Leeum Museum of Art, will be exhibited at the Metropolitan Museum of Art (The Met) in New York. This occasion is particularly significant as it represents the inaugural presentation of a Korean modern and contemporary art exhibition at The Met, which stands among the world’s top four art museums.

The Met has revealed plans to host the Lineages: Korean Art at The Met exhibition from November 7 to October 30 of the following year to commemorate the 25th anniversary of the opening of the Arts of Korea Gallery. The exhibition will feature works by artists such as Baik Nam-sun, Whanki Kim, Lee Ufan, and Lee Seung-taek, with the display being structured around four central themes. The Arts of Korea Gallery at The Met was established in 1998 with the support of the Korea Exchange Bank and the operating fund from the Samsung Cultural Foundation.

This Korean exhibition, curated by Eleanor Hyun, aims to showcase the struggles of artists who sought new identities by traveling between Korea, the United States, and France, which are reflected in their works from that era. In response to this, Hyun explained that amidst the turmoil of the Japanese invasion, war, and the influx of new culture, the artists of that time created a new tradition, and Korean modern and contemporary art continues to incorporate all these changes into its works.

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