Latest Events in Seoul(May Updated)

Join us for the Born Pink World Tour in Seoul! Get ready to experience an electrifying live performance by your favorite artist. This in-person event promises to be unforgettable, with incredible music, stunning visuals, and an atmosphere like no other. Don't miss out on this opportunity to see them live on stage. Mark your calendars and get your tickets now! Information Source: Mr.X | eventbrite

Adeni-Jones is a London-born Nigerian artist known for his brightly coloured portraits inspired by Yoruba culture. His work is rooted in West Africa’s ancient history and the region’s unique contemporary artistic discourse. Influenced by the Harlem Renaissance and modern art masters such as Aaron Douglas and Kerry James Marshall, he delves into themes of the African diaspora and his own position as a British artist of Nigerian descent. These characteristics of the artist are clearly on display in this exhibition. Against an abstract background covered in lush foliage, elastic, sinuous body outlines repeatedly intersect to create a fusion of form and colour. The viewer experiences a state of selflessness.

Pace Gallery is hosting a two-part exhibition in Seoul and Tokyo, exploring the world of American abstract painter Kenneth Noland (1924-2010). The first will be held at Pace Seoul from January 10 to March 29, 2025, followed by Pace Tokyo from March 7 to April 19. This exhibition, held independently in two cities, presents major series produced between the 1960s and the early 2000s. In particular, it includes representative works of art historical significance that were difficult to see in past exhibitions. In particular, it is the first time in 30 years since Noland's solo exhibition was held in Korea at the Gana Art Center in 1995. This exhibition, which is being held in Korea and Japan for the first time in 30 years, comprehensively illuminates Noland's world of work. Kenneth Noland, an early member of the Washington Color School, was known for his paintings with sharp outlines and clean colors, and was a leading proponent of the "hard edge" style.

Opening in January 2025, White Cube presents Tunji Adeniyi-Jones’s first exhibition in Korea, debuting a new series of paintings. Born and educated in the UK and now living and working in New York City, Adeniyi-Jones’s practice is inspired by his Yoruba heritage, as well as the ancient history of West Africa and its attendant myths.

Come join us for a night filled with laughter and fun. Audience members are encouraged to throw words to the comedians and the comedians will use these random words to form their sets. This event will be filled with spontaneity, excitement and of course, raucous laughter! Don't miss out on this chance to support local talent and have a great time. See you at the Newcomer's Comedy Open Mic! Doors open at 7:30pm Show starts at 8pm Information Source: Planet Hustle | eventbrite

Education Korea 2025, set to take place in the heart of Seoul at the impressive COEX venue, is gearing up to be an unmissable event for those in the education sector. Spanning three days, from January 15th to January 17th, 2025, it's the perfect opportunity for educators, students, and industry professionals to come together and exchange ideas. With its forward-thinking agenda, Education Korea 2025 promises to be a melting pot of innovation, where the latest educational trends and technologies will be explored and celebrated. It's not just a run-of-the-mill conference; it's the event of the decade for anyone passionate about shaping the future of education in Korea. Attendees can expect a packed schedule of workshops, keynotes, and networking opportunities, all designed to foster collaboration and inspire new ways of learning. So, mark the calendar and set the destination to COEX, Seoul, Korea, for an event that will undoubtedly shape the educational landscape for years to come.

Crowd Calling Comedy Open Mic Come join us for a night of laughter at Lit Lounge Itaewon! Our Comedy Open Mic event is the perfect opportunity for aspiring comedians to showcase their talent and for audience members to enjoy some hilarious stand-up routines. All new comedians will get a free shot just for trying 🎤 Whether you're a seasoned or beginner comedian or just looking for a good time, this event is sure to entertain. So grab your friends and head over to Lit Lounge Itaewon for a night of laughs and fun! Doors open at 7:30pm Show starts at 8pm Information Source: Planet Hustle | eventbrite

Lehmann Maupin is pleased to present Sublime Simulacra, a group exhibition curated by Andy St. Louis. Featuring works by Kim Yun Shin, Kim Chang Euk, Hong Soun, and Scott Kahn, the exhibition speculates on the potential for landscape paintings to generate shifts in the ways that images mediate our experience of the natural environment. In Sublime Simulacra, the landscape serves as an inflection point for new modes of perception. The ultimate reality of images was first contested by Plato, who theorized that all representations can be categorized as one of two types: exact (“truthful”) reproductions or deliberately distorted (“false”) likenesses. Jean Baudrillard’s seminal 1981 treatise Simulacra and Simulation expanded upon Plato’s theory by introducing the notion of the simulacrum, defined as an imitation that fails to make reference to its original. In postmodern artistic discourse, simulacra are typically conceptualized as representations of representations—copies based on other copies—that do not derive from empirical experience, thus blurring the line between the actual and the imaginary. This fundamental inability to distinguish objective reality from subjective representation informs much of postmodernist thought, which polemicizes the mediation of the real through simulacra. According to Baudrillard, the apotheosis of this phenomenon occurs when a representation is so lifelike that it creates its own reality, or hyperreality, effectively destroying the hegemony of the real and rewiring the cognitive connection between perception and belief.

Sublime Simulacra Kim Yun Shin, Kim Chang Euk, Hong Soun, and Scott Kahn Seoul January 22 – March 15, 2025

Gallery Hyundai is pleased to present a solo exhibition, Couturage, Nouage, by Shin Sung Hy (1948–2009) from February 5 to March 16, 2025. The relationship between Shin and Gallery Hyundai began when, upon the recommendation of Kim Tschang-Yeul (1929–2021), Gallery Hyundai visited Shin’s studio in Paris, France, where he was working as a full-time artist. At that time, Shin Sung Hy’s paintings stood out in the Korean art world for their vibrant colors and distinctive techniques, such as “tearing up thick cardboard to create collages” and “pierced space.” In 1988, Gallery Hyundai hosted Shin’s first solo exhibition, featuring his latest works at the time, accompanied by an essay written by a renowned art critic Lee Yil (1932–1997) in the exhibition catalogue. During the IMF financial crisis, Gallery Hyundai transported dozens of his new nouage paintings by renting a truck in Paris to showcase them at Art Basel in Basel, setting a sold-out record, and maintaining a valuable relationship that continues to this day.

The Seoul National University Museum of Art (Director Shim Sang-yong) will hold the “Weapon World” exhibition from February 6 (Thursday) to May 4 (Sunday), 2025, showcasing the power of art that contrasts with weapons through approximately 120 works by domestic and foreign artists. This exhibition reflects on our present through weapons that embody the cutting-edge technology of modern society, and highlights artworks that explore the form and purpose of weapons. The concept of arms tax involves the broad impact of military activities such as weapons production, technology development, defense industry and war, as well as the complex military-industrial complex surrounding these activities, on the global environment and the future of mankind. If the "Anthropocene" explores the geological impact of human activities on the earth's ecosystem, and the "Capitalistocene" explains the impact of the expansion of the capitalist system on society and nature, then the "arms tax" is to recognize and warn of the dangers of militaristic civilization based on these concepts. To help people get to know the exhibition, we will be hosting curator-led tours of the exhibition on the last Wednesday of each month, “Culture Day”. Curator-led tours of the exhibition are scheduled for Wednesday, February 26, Wednesday, March 26, and Wednesday, April 24 from 2:00 to 3:00 p.m.

Tang Contemporary Art is pleased to announce that it will launch artist Wang You’s latest solo exhibition “Blame the Sunshine” at its Seoul space at 4pm on February 7, 2025. Curated by Sun Dongdong, the exhibition features 17 paintings created by Wang You in the past two years, showcasing the freedom, boldness and passion that the artist has invested in painting.

Come join us for a night filled with laughter and fun. Audience members are encouraged to throw words to the comedians and the comedians will use these random words to form their sets. This event will be filled with spontaneity, excitement and of course, raucous laughter! Doors open at 7:30pm Show starts at 8pm Information Source: Planet Hustle | eventbrite

Rolling out from MAAP LAB Seoul, we'll take the 65KM Paldang Bridge Loop. A ride that blends the best of Seoul’s cycling culture with its urban energy. Information Source: MAAP | eventbrite

Thaddeus Ropac Seoul will host Alvaro Barrington's first solo exhibition in Korea, , on February 14th. Berrington, who constantly explores ways to communicate culture in a larger context through art, collaborates with the local festival 'Notting Hill Carnival' held in the Notting Hill area of ​​London every year to develop various media and pictorial experiments, further expanding the boundaries of painting and its methods presented in non-traditional environments.

An Sang-hoon's paintings are constantly revealing and erasing. Starting from images destined to disappear from photographs, they undergo countless painterly decisions, transforming into abstract canvases, their traces solidifying on the surface. In this process, the concepts of "hand" and "stain" operate as potential elements in his works. The hand leaves marks at every stage, and the stain accepts these marks, existing in an imperfect state. Stains often reveal the truth before disappearing, briefly existing quietly in the canvas. They wander between disappearance and persistence, constantly transforming and reborn. The works begin with these disappearing moments. Photos discarded in the trash bin of an iPhone, destined to be erased as vaguely as fragments of memory, are summoned onto the canvas through techniques such as watercolor, acrylic and spray paint to form initial layers. However, this is only the beginning. The figurative image is transformed and destroyed again through thick layers of paint and finger painting, a process that is not just deconstruction, but a search for the seeds of new order in chaos. Recent works such as "Plants that Can't Survive the Winter", "Green Santa Claus" and "Morning Exercise" imagine various layers as a single plane, combining them flatly with oil paint alone. The artist's method is closely related to his attitude towards painting, which manifests as a resistance to the traditional meaning of painting. He does not regard painting as a mere tool for representation, so in his works, traces of reference or appropriation are either removed or rendered invalid. Even the title of the work is severed from the image, leaving the language trace unexplained in the canvas. This attitude explores another possibility of painting. Unlike the common tendency in contemporary painting to assign meaning, he reveals the inherent potential of painting itself by removing the network of representation and meaning. He is constantly changing, exploring new possibilities of painting in chaos, and sometimes wavering in the face of the uncertainty he encounters. For him, uncertainty is not a threat, but an opportunity for new possibilities and experiments, the potential to repeat failures in an unfinished and unstable state, to constantly question his own paintings.

Love Contemporary Art will hold the ​​exhibition from Friday, February 14 to Saturday, March 15, presenting approximately 25 works by artists Kang Seung-woo, Kim Hyung-soo, and Jin Taek in various media, including installation art, digital art, and paintings. This exhibition, in which artists born in the 1990s who grew up in an abundance of media participated, presents a new visual concept with a derealized sense in which the existence of ‘me’ proliferates like an echo in the digital world as a generation that experienced both digital and analog. The three artists unfold their selves depicted from various angles on the screen, such as an experimental approach that expands the digital screen to a canvas, precise reproduction of a flat spatial sense, and abstract expression of the unconscious. They cross the boundaries between painting and digital media, and interpret the multi-layered structure of contemporary identity and perception through formative language.

Ha Jong-hyun 5975 The Art Center will present "Ha Jong-Hyun 5975" from February 14 to April 20, focusing on the early works of artist Ha Jong-Hyun (1959-1975). The exhibition explores how Ha's materials and painting techniques interacted and developed with the contemporary context of Korea at the time. Ha's early works responded to turbulent periods in Korea's recent history, including the Korean War and rapid industrialization and urbanization, and expanded his experimentation with various materials and materiality. His works are full of experimental attempts to reconstruct social reality and personal experience, and question the possibilities of painting.