[Gallery Walk] The Role and Variations of Collections in a Changing Environment

National Museum of Modern and Contemporary Art Seoul, Variable Collection Exhibition
16 Works by Domestic and International Artists, 20 Items of Materials

The National Museum of Modern and Contemporary Art (MMCA) is hosting an exhibition that highlights how modern art collections with variable characteristics reinterpret their roles and meanings in changing environments.

Kim Hong-seok, Objective-Poor Interpretation of People (8 points each), Variable Size Each,
[Photo by National Museum of Modern and Contemporary Art]

The special exhibition of collections titled "Variable Collections," which opened on the 29th at the MMCA Seoul in Jongno-gu, Seoul, showcases over 20 works and materials by 16 domestic and international artists including Kim Hong-seok, Nam June Paik, Walid Raad, Lee Ju-yo, Oh In-hwan, and Cody Choi.

The exhibition is organized around three themes: "Variable Relationships," "Variable Sizes," and "Variable Places."

It sheds light on the "variable" nature of contemporary art that continuously changes and is newly interpreted?works created using immaterial elements such as scent, sound, memory, and relationships; works completed through processes involving the artist’s ideas, imagination, science, technology, and collaboration; and works created in different time periods or specific locations that are re-presented in new places and contexts. Through this, the exhibition focuses on the artist’s intention and interpretation that elicit open interpretations of contemporary artworks that cannot be strictly defined.

Under "Variable Relationships," the exhibition explores themes of collaboration and immateriality through Hans HAACKE’s Ice Table (1967) and Walid RAAD’s Preface to the Ninth Edition: Mawan Kassab-Bachi (1934-2016) (2017). It examines not only the collaboration between art and technology but also the expansion of themes and relationality through various forms of collaboration.

By presenting Nam June Paik’s representative MMCA collection More the Better (1988) along with its various video storage devices and monitors as well as archival materials, the exhibition intriguingly shows how museum collections have undergone changes alongside technological environments.

Walid Raad, Preface to the Ninth Edition_Mawan Kasab-Bachi (1934-2016), 2017, 29 Frames and Drawings, Wooden Wall, Wallpaper, Variable Size,
[Photo by National Museum of Modern and Contemporary Art]

In "Variable Sizes," the exhibition features works listed as "variable size" in the museum’s online collection search that are not installed in a fixed position or manner but allow room for interpretation by the installer.

Focusing on works such as Lee Ju-yo’s Five Story Tower (2019-2020) and Kim So-ra’s Don’t Ask Me Why (2010), which move and change variably depending on the size and arrangement of the exhibition space, the exhibition examines the artist’s intention, manuals, and the transforming space and sensory experience.

"Variable Places" highlights how site-specific works created for particular locations, such as Cody Choi’s Venice Biennale project (2016-2017) and Park Chan-kyung’s Exhibition Room 5 (2019), generate new contexts when they leave their original sites and are re-presented in other exhibitions.

Additionally, various oral histories, interviews, installation manuals, and other materials left by the artists during the acquisition process?usually not publicly disclosed in exhibitions?are provided to help audiences better understand the works.

Kim Sung-hee, director of the National Museum of Modern and Contemporary Art, said, “Through this exhibition, we hope to expand the scope of art and explore the variable nature of contemporary works, reflecting on their creation, preservation, and transmission to future generations, offering new opportunities for artistic experiences.”

The exhibition runs until July 21.