Art shows this week

An art museum disguised as a container box building, the National Museum of Modern and Contemporary Art doesn’t have what looks like a proper roof. But starting this July, a structure will be installed in the courtyard of the museum. The winning project of the Young Architects Program (YAP) this year, “Roof Sentiment” is a 500kg structure composed of reed blinds by architect team SoA (Society of Architecture), Lee Chi-hoon and Kang Ye-rin. Resembling the grooves of corrugated cardboard bent in wave-like curves, the outdoor sculpture project will open Jul 1–Sep 30, with a whole bunch of summer-appropriate events happening throughout its lifespan.

“Here’s Ju Tae-seok, your favorite artist dear.” An old couple stops in front of Ju’s painting of Seokpajeong to admire its summer greenery. With all the walls painted black, the space appears a little too dark, but the Seoul Museum is known among Seoul museums and galleries for using one of the best spotlights. As the curator explains that the lights are designed to show the true colors of the paintings, I let out something like a gasp of acknowledgement. It’s not the fancy lights that surprise me, but the fact that the curator himself is taking the time to walk me through all the works in the exhibition. “Visitors to the museum are normally on the older side,” explains the curator. “They like seeing these kinds of landscapes by modern Korean painters.”    Walking past Ju’s painting of Seokpajeong reduced by abstraction, vivid orchards open the next exhibition, depicting the rural sceneries of Paju, Lee Dae-won’s hometown. In the farthest right corner of the exhibition, the melody of “Orchard Road” plays. It’s a traditional Korean children’s song and you can hear it just faintly. The scenery is all about seasonal change until I head up to the top floor to see “All (is) Vanity,” a group exhibition on contemporary art sculptures, both kinetic and stagnant. Although there aren’t any lingering curators in place to personally guide you through the exhibit, there are multiple wall and floor texts next to each of the artworks, hinting at the curatorial direction without being...

Established by multimillionaire gallerist Kim Chang-il, Arario Gallery first opened its doors in Cheonan in 2012 before moving to its current place in Sogyeok-dong, Seoul. Making The ARTnews "200 Top Collectors" list for 7 years now, the internationally respected gallery boasts three-stories of exhibition space. At times, the basement and the upper levels are separated to showcase two exhibitions with unrelated curatorial goals. Although the gallery’s main interest lies in contemporary art, it branches off to support domestic as well as international artists in their early to mid-careers.