South Korea elected a leftist president this week with minimal foreign policy experience and a predisposition to seek dialogue with the country’s communist enemies – a prime opportunity for the Chinese Communist Party to improve relations with Seoul, potentially at the expense of the United States.
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Seoul, South Korea — An impressive 77.8% of South Korea’s eligible voters turned up at polling stations Tuesday to cast their ballots in a snap presidential election sparked by the impeachment of the country’s former leader. It was the highest turnout ever seen in a Korean election, and the country’s media said exit polls made a victory by Democratic Party candidate Lee Jae-myung all but certain after the voting ended.
An exit poll conducted jointly by three of South Korea’s biggest broadcasters, which has generally been a reliable predictor of election results, showed Lee securing about 50% of the votes, giving him about a 10% lead over his conservative rival Kim Moon-soo.
Kim had recently served as the employment and labor minister in the Cabinet of former President Yoon Suk Yeol, who was impeached over his brief but shocking imposition of martial law late last year.
Lee’s Democratic Party has been the primary opposition party for several years, but if he wins the South Korean presidency as predicted, the Democrats will find themselves back in control of both the executive branch and the parliament, where they already have a majority of seats, for the first time since 2022.
There has not been an elected president in office since Yoon was impeached late last year, so there will be no formal transition period. The inauguration ceremony for the 21st president of South Korea is set to be held Wednesday, just hours after the final votes were cast.
South Koreans filled the streets around central government buildings in Seoul in December after Yoon suddenly declared martial law. He said the draconian measure was necessary given the level of political division in South Korea, and claiming communist forces were threatening the public peace and safety.
But Yoon’s definition of an enemy within changed, as he first said the communists infiltrating South Korean politics were North Koreans, but then said it was Chinese influence that warranted his martial law declaration.
Many younger South Koreans bristled, and they came out in force in front of the parliament, urging lawmakers to impeach Yoon, who did maintain significant support, particularly among older and right-wing voters.
His huge political gamble with the martial law declaration, and his subsequent refusal to leave office following his impeachment, is widely seen as having shifted many voters to Lee and the Democratic Party.
Yoon beat Lee in the last presidential election in 2022, but by a razor-thin margin of only 247,077 votes.
Lee is a veteran politician with 20 years of experience as an elected official.
He will rely on that experience to help him navigate the power struggle between South Korea’s longtime closest ally, the United States, and its neighbor China, as Presidents Trump and Xi Jinping engage in a trade war that has affected global markets.
Lee vowed before the election that, if he won, he would work to further develop the U.S.-South Korea relationship “into a future-oriented, comprehensive strategic alliance.”
Daniel Ceng/Anadolu via Getty Images
Lee also promised “stable management of Korea-China relations, promotion of Korea-Russia diplomacy,” and to prioritize South Korea’s national interests.
He has vowed to invest up to 100 trillion won (about $73 billion) to fund artificial intelligence work in the country, aiming to make South Korea one of the top three global AI powerhouses.
But Lee has offered little in the way of firm, specific commitments, and many South Koreans remained unclear about what kind of diplomatic policies he might adopt if and when he takes the country’s highest office.
Before South Korea descended into internal political chaos in late 2024, the former conservative government had taken a hard line on North Korea and Kim Jong Un’s isolated regime, fueling higher tension across the two countries’ heavily militarized border.
If the election result does match the exit polls, Lee will take office facing multiple ongoing criminal cases, including a $1 billion property development scandal, alleged illegal remittances sent to North Korea, and the alleged misuse of government credit cards.
South Korean presidents do have a significant degree of immunity from criminal prosecution, though not from charges of treason or insurrection.
South Koreans are voting for a new president in a snap election triggered by the ouster of Yoon Suk Yeol, a conservative who is facing rebellion charges over his short-lived imposition of martial law late last year.
Voting began at 6 a.m. local time Tuesday at more than 14,000 polling stations nationwide, the election commission said. Voting ends at 8 p.m. local time, and observers say the winner could emerge as early as midnight.
More than 15 million people had already voted during a two-day early voting period last week, accounting for nearly 35% of the country’s 44.4 million eligible voters.
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Pre-election surveys suggest Yoon’s liberal archrival, Lee Jae-myung, appears headed for an easy win, riding a wave of public frustration over conservatives in the wake of Yoon’s martial law debacle. In a Facebook post, Lee called for voters to “deliver a stern and resolute judgement” against conservatives following the months of political turmoil.
Meanwhile, the main conservative candidate, Kim Moon-soo, has struggled to win over moderate, swing voters.
This election serves as another defining moment in the country’s resilient democracy, but observers worry a domestic divide worsened by Yoon is far from over and could pose a big political burden on the new president.
The winning candidate will immediately be sworn in as president for a single, full term of five years without the typical two-month transition period. The new president will face major challenges, including a slowing economy, President Trump’s America-first policies and North Korea’s evolving nuclear threats.
Chris Jung/NurPhoto via Getty Images
Lee has preached patience over Mr. Trump’s tariff policy, arguing it would be a mistake to rush negotiations in pursuit of an early agreement with Washington. Kim has said he would meet Mr. Trump as soon as possible.
In his final campaign speeches Monday, Lee promised to revitalize the economy, reduce inequality and ease national divisions. He urged the people to vote for him, arguing that a win by Kim would allow Yoon’s “rebellion forces” to return.
“If they somehow win, that would mean the return of the rebellion forces, the destruction of democracy, the deprival of people’s human rights, the normalization of martial law and our country’s downfall into a backward, third-world nation,” Lee told the crowd gathered at a Seoul park.
PEDRO PARDO/AFP via Getty Images
Kim, a former labor minister under Yoon, warned that a Lee win would allow him to wield excessive power, launch political retaliation against opponents and legislate laws to protect him from various legal troubles, as his party already controls parliament.
Lee “is now trying to seize all power in South Korea and establish a Hitler-like dictatorship,” Kim told a rally in the southeastern city of Busan.
Relations with North Korea remain badly strained since 2019, with the North focused on expanding its nuclear arsenal while refusing dialogue with South Korea and the U.S.
Since his second term began in January, Mr. Trump has repeatedly expressed his intent to resume diplomacy with North Korean leader Kim Jong Un, but Kim has so far ignored the offer while making Russia his priority in foreign policy.
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Lee, who wants warmer ties with North Korea, recently acknowledged it would be “very difficult” to realize a summit with Kim Jong Un anytime soon. Lee said he would support Mr. Trump’s push to restart talks with Kim Jong Un, which he believed would eventually allow South Korea to be involved in some projects in North Korea.
Foreign policy strategists for Lee understand there isn’t much South Korea can do to bring about a denuclearization of North Korea, said Paik Wooyeal, a professor at Seoul’s Yonsei University.
He said Lee also doesn’t share the Korean nationalistic zeal held by ex-liberal President Moon Jae-in, who met Kim Jong Un three times during his 2017-2022 term.
A 17-year-old soldier who was killed during the Korean War has been accounted for 75 years after he went missing, officials said Monday.
Army Cpl. Albert J. Estrada was a member of Battery B, 57th Field Artillery Battalion, 31st Regimental Combat Team, 7th Infantry Division, the Defense POW/MIA Accounting Agency said in a news release. He began service in July 1950, according to the Korean War Veterans Memorial Foundation. He was one of tens of thousands of soldiers present at the Battle of Chosin Reservoir in November and December 1950, the DPAA said.
During the battle, 30,000 United Nations servicemembers, including U.S. soldiers, faced off against 120,000 Chinese and North Korean enemy forces in “rugged terrain in lethally cold weather,” the DPAA said. The battle, which the DPAA described as “one of the most brutal” of the entire war, raged for 17 days.
Korean War Veterans Memorial Foundation
Army officials wanted to push North Korean forces into China and sever supply lines near the Chosin reservoir, the DPAA said. But the North Korean forces launched a surprise attack that forced one group of soldiers to retreat in late November. A few days later, Chinese soldiers surrounded and isolated another group of soldiers. A task force was hastily assembled to try to organize a withdrawal. A “bitter fight” allowed U.N. forces to open an airfield to bring in reinforcements and evacuate casualties on December 1, according to the U.S. military, and eventually, the U.N. soldiers managed a full retreat.
More than 1,000 U.S. Marines and soldiers were killed during this time, the DPAA said. Thousands more were injured or incapacitated by the cold weather. Due to the elements and the retreat, “hundreds of fallen Marines and soldiers were unable to be immediately recovered,” the DPAA said.
Estrada was one of the soldiers who could not be located after the battle. He was reported missing on Dec. 6, 1950. There was no information to indicate that he was ever held as a prisoner of war, the DPAA said. Three years later, on Dec. 31, 1953, the U.S. Army issued a presumptive finding of death.
Defense POW/MIA Accounting Agency
Between 1953 and 1954, the North Korean government returned thousands of remains of soldiers who had died during the Korean War. The remains had been buried in U.N. cemeteries in North Korea. The effort, known as Operation Glory, included the return of 500 sets of remains that had been buried near the Chosin reservoir. All but 126 of the remains were identified. The unidentified remains were buried as unknowns at the National Memorial Cemetery of the Pacific, the DPAA said.
From 1990 to 1994, the North Korean government returned 47 additional containers of remains attributed to the Battle of Chosin Reservoir. From those recovery efforts, the DPAA and the organizations that preceded it were able to identify over 130 of the unaccounted-for missing personnel lost in the Chosin Reservoir Campaign.
The DPAA did not say which handover Estrada’s remains were recovered from. A full announcement of his accounting will be shared at a later date, the agency said.
Estrada earned multiple military honors, including the Purple Heart, the National Defense Service Medal, and the Republic of Korea War Service Medal, according to the Korean War Veterans Memorial Foundation.
Estrada’s surviving siblings, Manuel Estrada and Ruth Tucker, have long lobbied for his identification, according to a 2018 article from The Daily Democrat. That year, Tucker was presented with a medal from the Republic of South Korea honoring her efforts to account for missing American soldiers who died during the Korean War. At the time, Tucker said complete identification of Korean War remains can take between four and five years.
Calligraphy by a South Korean independence hero, created while awaiting execution for assassinating a Japanese leader, is breaking new auction records in Seoul, as the country’s ultra-rich seek to bring historic artwork home.
Revered in the South for his efforts to defend the country against Japanese encroachment, Ahn Jung-geun is best known for his dramatic, high-stakes assassination of Japan’s first prime minister, Ito Hirobumi, in 1909 at a train station in Harbin. Ahn shouted “Hurrah for Korea!” as he was arrested, according to the Association for Asian Studies based in Ann Arbor, Michigan.
He was hanged for the killing by Japanese authorities in 1910, just months before Tokyo formally annexed the Korean Peninsula, ushering in a brutal period of occupation that lasted until the end of World War II.
Now, more than a century after his death, the calligraphy Ahn created in his prison cell during his final days — typically at the request of Japanese officials — is drawing fresh attention in Seoul’s glitzy art scene.
Jung Yeon-je/AFP via Getty Images
In South Korea, Ahn’s life has long inspired artists across generations, giving rise to a highly celebrated musical, multiple novels, and films — including one starring “Crash Landing on You” actor Hyun Bin.
Ahn was held in his prison cell in China for about 40 days leading up to his execution and he kept himself busy writing an autobiography and making hundreds of calligraphy pieces, including one requested by his own prison guard.
“The court and prison officials, saying they wanted to keep my calligraphy as a memento, brought me hundreds of sheets of silk and paper and asked me to create for them,” Ahn wrote in his autobiography. “I ended up spending several hours each day doing calligraphy, even though I wasn’t particularly skilled in it.”
Even though Ahn had assassinated their top official Ito, the Japanese who took his calligraphy preserved them with care, and some of their descendants have donated them to the South Korean government, which subsequently designated them as national treasures.
Now, more of the calligraphies are surfacing in the private art market, with the latest being auctioned last month in Seoul for 940 million won ($674,098) — more than three times its opening bid.
The piece, which says “green bamboo” — a traditional symbol of integrity — had been owned by a Japanese individual who did not wish to be identified, and they had done an impeccable job preserving it, said Kim Jun-seon, art valuation specialist at Seoul Auction.
“It wasn’t even mounted and was still rolled up, but when we opened the case, the scent of ink still lingered in the air,” she told AFP.
Japan said Ahn was a criminal and terrorist and refused to hand over his remains. They have never been located.
Moves to honor Ahn by Seoul and Beijing have previously strained ties with Tokyo, even briefly sparking a diplomatic row in 2013.
In 2014, Japan criticized a memorial built in China to commemorate Ahn, BBC News reported. A Japanese government spokesman branded him a terrorist after the Chinese-Korean memorial hall opened in China’s Harbin city, where Ito was shot.
The fact that his Japanese captors preserved his calligraphy “reflects the cultural and political contradictions of early 20th century East Asia,” said Eugene Y. Park, a history professor at University of Nevada, Reno.
At his trial, Ahn identified himself as a soldier for Korea, defined his assassination of Ito as a military operation, and envisioned a united East Asia — comprising Korea, China and Japan — somewhat akin to today’s European Union.
“Some Japanese may have seen him as a misguided but principled idealist,” Park told AFP.
Universal History Archive/Universal Images Group via Getty Images
His calligraphy, which focused on values such as peace and ethics, “resonated culturally, even if he opposed them politically,” he said.
“At a time when Japan’s own imperial identity was unsettled, preserving his works revealed deeper tensions between respect for moral courage and the pursuit of colonial domination.”
In 2023, the Global Sae-A Group, a South Korean conglomerate, purchased one of Ahn’s calligraphies for a record-breaking 1.95 billion won (nearly $1.4 million).
The piece “Green Bamboo” was sold at auction last month to the family of South Korea’s LS Group.
“We expressed our intention to bring the piece back to Korea and share it with the public,” Joung Tae-hee at Seoul Auction said, adding that the Japanese owner agreed to sell after hearing their proposal.
Lee Sang-hyun, of the LS Group family, told AFP that his mother “hopes many citizens will be able to see this piece and that it will also be studied,” and they are considering donating it to a national institution.
Ahn became a Catholic as a teenager and ends his autobiography with the words of Nicolas Joseph Marie Wilhelm, a French priest and missionary stationed in Korea, who traveled to his prison to see the activist and give him confession.
The priest — who had also baptized Ahn and was a longtime friend — was disciplined for his trip, and was later forced to return to France.
“The gracious lord will never abandon you,” Wilhelm told Ahn. “He will surely take you in, so rest your heart and go in peace.”
Few people—aside from perhaps her mother—have played as pivotal a role in positioning South Korea on the global art map as New York-based dealer Tina Kim. Born in California, Kim was immersed in the art world from an early age, accompanying her mother, Hyun-Sook Lee, on artist visits and exhibition tours, and actively contributing to the organization of exhibitions and publications. Lee is the founder of Kukje Gallery in Seoul—arguably South Korea’s most influential gallery—which is where Kim began her career, helping to mount exhibitions for some of contemporary art’s most established names, including Louise Bourgeois, Roni Horn, Anish Kapoor, Alexander Calder, Jean-Michel Basquiat and Joan Mitchell. These early experiences laid the foundation for what would become a groundbreaking international career.
The 1980s marked a period of rapid economic growth in South Korea, driven by post-dictatorship modernization efforts after 1979. As the 1988 Olympics approached, the government recognized the cultural and diplomatic potential of the arts to enhance the country’s global profile. That moment coincided with the rise of Kukje Gallery and marked a new chapter for the Korean art ecosystem. In the decades since, South Korea’s creative industries—especially pop culture—have fueled a global surge in visibility, with the so-called “Korean Wave” extending well beyond K-pop and K-dramas to include contemporary Korean art, which has increasingly captured international attention and acclaim.
Still, Kim chose to put down roots in New York after her studies, driven by a desire to carve out her own identity in the art world. “I wanted to have something that was mine,” Kim tells Observer when we catch up with her ahead of the spring art fairs. This year marks the tenth anniversary of the opening of her brick-and-mortar space in Chelsea.
Kim’s gallery first opened on 57th Street in 2002, taking over a space once occupied by London’s storied Anthony d’Offay Gallery, known for its ambitious presentations of artists like Joseph Beuys, Cindy Sherman and Gilbert & George. “Anthony was somebody I had worked very closely with on many exhibitions,” Kim recalls, adding that she initially continued her collaboration with Kukje Gallery. “I continued working closely with my mother, mainly in the secondary market, and geared towards the needs of the market in Korea. I was often going to auctions or helping with institutional exhibitions in the States.”
She admits that her mother was initially less than thrilled about her decision to open an independent gallery rather than remain fully involved in the family business. She worried that her daughter would be “literally throwing herself into the shark tank” of New York’s notoriously competitive art scene and feared the move might spark unnecessary tensions with American colleagues, since many of the artists Kim hoped to work with already had representation in New York.
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A fundamental shift came in 2015, when Kim moved to her current space in Chelsea, debuting with “Happy Together,” an exhibition curated by Clara Kim, now chief curator at L.A. MOCA, featuring a broad constellation of Asian artists responding to social and political tensions in the region. “That show really set the future direction of the gallery,” Kim recalls. “I was interested in presenting artists who are relevant to the current political and cultural moment—artists making an impact and speaking across borders.”
Before launching her own program, Kim worked at Paula Cooper Gallery, which is now just next door. “It’s nice that Paula often visits my gallery and compliments my shows,” Kim adds. “I think it’s very meaningful for me that I am on 21st Street.”
Notably, 2015 also marked the opening of the Dansaekhwa collateral exhibition at the 56th Venice Biennale, which Kim organized and which is now widely regarded as a defining moment in the global recognition of Korean modern art. By bringing the Dansaekhwa movement to international attention, the exhibition sparked its meteoric rise in the art market and helped dispel long-held misconceptions. “Many scholars misunderstood pan se qua, which literally translates as ‘monochromic paintings,’ as a Korean interpretation of American Minimalism—the exhibition showed that it was quite the contrary.”
The show clarified that Dansaekhwa was born from a distinct historical context in South Korea, which at the time was still under dictatorship and recovering from the Korean War (1950-53). The movement emerged as an act of resilience and resistance by artists navigating the urgent need to redefine their cultural identity. While breaking from inherited aesthetic traditions, they also grounded their “new Korean artistic language” in fundamental traditional principles, actively resisting Western influences. “Artists were expressing their frustration with the oppressive government censorship of the ‘70s and ‘80s,” Kim explains. “The country was undergoing rapid industrialization and urban development, but the government was also making major decisions with strict media control. There were demonstrations, which led to the Gwangju Uprising in May of 1980. In this context, artists turned to art to resist both the military government and Western influence.”
As Kim suggests, Dansaekhwa is far closer to action painting than initially understood—these artists were making personal, original marks: pushing, scratching, and cracking the surface, breaking with tradition. Their approach aligns more with postwar European movements like Gruppo Zero, Lucio Fontana’s Spatialism and European Informel, which questioned and subverted the physical and conceptual limits of the canvas as a site for representation.
Kim admits that the exhibition came together as a last-minute decision. In 2014, Kukje Gallery organized a Dansaekhwa show in Seoul, coinciding with the La International Biennale Foundation’s gathering in the city. After seeing the exhibition, Germano Celant and Okwui Enwezor, who would go on to curate “All the World’s Futures” at the 56th Venice Biennale, encouraged Kim to bring the work to Venice. The timing proved ideal for bringing these artists to the global stage.
Today, names included in the show—pioneers of Korea’s earliest abstraction and avant-garde, such as Ha Chong-Hyun, Park Seo-Bo and Mono-ha artist Lee Ufan—have seen significant market appreciation and are now held in major museums. This exhibition undeniably contributed to that recognition.
“I was fortunate that Doryun Chong from the M+ Museum, at the time, was just starting to build the museum’s collection,” Kim says. “Other curators, like Alexandra Munroe, the Samsung Asian art curator at the Guggenheim Museum who curated the Gutai show in 2013, also recognized the importance of this group of artists right away and selected works for their museums.” Kim explains that this early interest led to Dansaekhwa works entering collections at MoMA, the Art Institute of Chicago and the Hirshhorn, among others.
Kim played a pivotal role in securing many of the institutional acquisitions that have elevated Asian artists and artists from the Asian diaspora. Her gallery’s dedication to curatorial excellence, academic rigor and ambitious experimentation did not go unnoticed by institutional leaders. “U.S. institutions have only recently started looking seriously at Asian and Asian American artists,” Kim says. “I’m fortunate to be in this position to support this mission and help build the bridge.”
Today, the landscape for Korean contemporary art has changed dramatically. Korean artists are increasingly featured in international institutions and recognized at major global events, from biennials to top-tier art fairs. Both government and private funding have played essential roles in propelling this Korean Wave into the art world. “Today, K-pop and K-drama are popular worldwide, and Korean art, of course, is benefiting from this widespread interest in Korean culture,” Kim says. “I have so many friends and clients visiting Korea every year, and Frieze Seoul, along with major biennials in Busan and Gwangju, are regularly attracting curators and museum directors.” Kim points out that many international galleries have also opened in Seoul, helping showcase Korean artists abroad. Government-funded programs continue to support Korean artists and curators both domestically and internationally, fostering visibility and cultural exchange. In parallel, major corporations such as Samsung and Hyundai are investing heavily in this growth. “Korean sponsors, you know, recognize the benefit of sponsoring major institutions.”
Asked about the perceived bubble—and potential correction—within the South Korean art market, Kim is confident that the country’s place on the global stage is secure, even if the pace may be shifting to more sustainable levels. “South Korea has such a strong collecting base and institutional system: the number of private corporate museums is growing, and even public museums are extremely active, with their funds supporting more art,” she explains. “There’s been a huge growth in the Korean collector base, and they remain active, even if at a different pace. Plus, new collectors are continuously entering the market.”
Frieze Seoul has consistently exceeded expectations for Tina Kim Gallery, achieving strong results both in sales and in institutional relationship-building since its inaugural edition. “My market is the U.S.,” Kim explains. “I’ve long focused on building my market here, and I wasn’t trying to sell Korean art back to Korea. I was so lucky—people were very excited to have us there, as they noticed and acknowledged what we were doing in New York.” More significantly, she adds, participating in the fair—and planning trips to nearby countries before and after—has been critical for cultivating her collector base and institutional network across the region.
While Kim’s vision for the gallery has long centered on building a platform for Asian artists and the Asian diaspora, her sights are now set on broadening the scope of the program. “I try to identify artists who are relevant in art history, contributing, you know—I help contribute to their research scholarship and help them to enter museums’ collections,” she says.
Kim points to several notable instances where her gallery’s support has been pivotal in advancing careers and bringing overdue attention to important regional figures. For instance, after taking on young Korean artist Mire Lee following her participation in the 2022 Venice Biennale, Kim introduced her to New York audiences with a museum-quality show of ambitious, experimental installations—one that came with high production costs and substantial risk. Lee later revisited elements of this work in her acclaimed New Museum exhibition the following year and, last October, scaled it up even further with her monumental installation at Tate’s Turbine Hall as part of the Hyundai Commission.
In a similar vein, Kim has played a critical role in the long-overdue recognition of Filipino artist Pacita Abad. She began representing Abad’s estate in 2022, just as a major U.S. retrospective opened at the Walker Art Center before traveling to SFMOMA and then MoMA PS1. “I’m proud to say that Pacita Abad is now one of the most widely collected Asian artists,” Kim says, pointing to the significance of Abad’s work in portraying Asian American immigrant stories—not as narratives of victimhood, but as affirmations of resilience and strength. “That’s what I like about her work. She really celebrates Asian culture while embracing a cosmopolitan perspective.”
Throughout our conversation, Kim often returned to the dynamism of South Asia—not just for its expanding collector base (she noted that most of her sales at Frieze Seoul went to South Asian collectors) but also for its emerging museums and vibrant artistic output. “I’m eager to expand my program to include a wider spectrum of Southeast Asian artists,” Kim said, revealing that the gallery will mount a major curated group exhibition of South Asian artists this summer.
Confirming the academic rigor that defines its curatorial program, Tina Kim Gallery will unveil a major exhibition this May, “The Making of Modern Korean Art: The Letters of Kim Tschang-Yeul, Kim Whanki, Lee Ufan and Park Seo-Bo, 1961-1982.” Timed to coincide with both the 10-year anniversary of the gallery’s Chelsea space and the landmark Dansaekhwa exhibition, the show brings to light the personal and intellectual exchanges between four pivotal artists as they helped shape the trajectory of modern Korean art in the decades following the Korean War.
Featuring major paintings by Kim Tschang-Yeul, Kim Whanki, Lee Ufan and Park Seo-Bo—alongside their original correspondence, archival documents, photographs and ephemera—the exhibition traces the global dialogues and artistic debates that laid the foundation for Korean modernism’s first international breakthrough.
“Korean art’s prominence today is not just a result of recent support and investment on multiple levels,” Kim says. “It was really grounded in the efforts these artists made in the ’50s, ’60s and ’70s. It didn’t happen overnight.” She explains how the letters exchanged between the artists became critical tools for sharing exhibition plans, navigating diplomatic hurdles and sustaining an emerging network of transnational collaboration. “These letters show the depth of the struggles these artists faced,” Kim continues, recounting, for instance, how Park Seo-Bo and Kim Tschang-Yeul coordinated their participation in the 1961 Venice Biennale by mail. “One letter, for example, has Kim Tschang-Yeul telling Park Seo-Bo, ‘You must go to the Korean embassy and ask them to sign this, and you have to take it to the Biennale office by this date.’ They should really make a movie out of this.”
The exhibition—five years in the making—is accompanied by the release of a landmark publication featuring these never-before-published letters, offering new insight into the inner workings of a generation that helped bring Korean art onto the global stage.
Despite global headwinds, Kim remains confident in the continued growth of the art market, particularly across Asia. “Asian history and culture are so rich, going back thousands of years, alongside the region’s economic growth,” she says, underscoring the immense potential for further expansion. “Particularly in Southeast Asia, it’s only a matter of time—in the next 20 years, many museums will open in that region.”
Throughout our conversation, Kim reiterates her ongoing commitment to leading her gallery, even as she oversees a resourceful international team. She remains closely involved in all aspects of the gallery’s operations, including traveling to numerous fairs each year—an approach that continues to generate vital opportunities to meet clients and cultivate both new and longstanding relationships. “I think one of the other strengths I have is that I participate in many major international art fairs,” she says. “When you have a global market, you’re not heavily dependent on one region, allowing you to plan better for challenging times.” Kim also stresses the importance of maintaining a program that actively engages multiple regions. “I’m constantly researching to expand my program. You really have to think five years or ten years ahead.”
“The Making of Modern Korean Art” is on view at Tina Kim Gallery through June 21, 2025.
