This year’s SeMA Biennale incorporated the latest technological advances into media art. It was possible to host this event focused on media art, because at the center of it all was Seoul Museum of Art Director Kim Hong-hee. Kim is a leading authority in media art and feminism art.



She is an alternative art specialist, who established and ran Ssamzie Space in the trend-setting Hongdae area. She has been heading the Seoul Museum of Art for 5 years since 2012, leading the new trends in art exhibition. Kim had an eye for spotting promising artists and changes in time as well as passion for art development, which perhaps explains how all the exhibitions she had organized became huge sensations. Then in 2005 she was named the first female artistic director for the Gwangju Biennale.

Her affection for biennales naturally came to center on the SeMA Biennale Mediacity Seoul after she was appointed the director of the Seoul Museum of Art five years ago. The first thing she did was to make the museum more accessible to ordinary people. The art museum she envisioned was a museum for people, a space like a playground. Kim’s shocking yet refreshing museum operation method may be giving rise to cultural democracy. Her vision was to overcome the limitations and old practices of conventional art museums and popularize art. Thanks to her unwavering idea, the Seoul Museum of Art is transforming into a post-museum of her dreams.