Learning From Antiquity: RM of BTS

Frieze Seoul’s arrival last year elevated Korea’s status by proving that it wasn’t only K-pop or K-drama but also Korean art scenes that attracted global attention. And your visit to the fair created more buzz than any press. I know you started collecting art in 2018, but I was amazed when Thaddeus Ropac told me about the great influence you have on young collectors. He said young Korean collectors like you espoused a knowledge and passion across a variety of artists and periods, and he had never seen it in other countries. Why do you collect art?

While touring the world, I began to appreciate visiting museums and looking at the paintings I learned about in school textbooks. But it dawned on me that, while I knew Monet and Van Gogh, I knew nothing about Korean artists. I now love Korean modern and contemporary art. They were squeezing paint on a palette when they went through the Japanese occupation and the Korean War. It’s comforting to know the hardships and the struggles that I go through are nothing compared to theirs. For them, it was a matter of life and death.

But there are also things people misunderstand about me. For instance, I actually don’t like everyone in Dansaekhwa [the monochrome painting and movement formed in Korea during the 1950s amid efforts to reconcile the influence of Western modernism on Korean artistic culture]. Yun Hyong-keun is the only one I admire. I don’t think you can frame or tie them together. In that sense, Dansaekhwa is like K or K-pop. I went to meet all the old gallery owners and late artists’ families to get to the bottom of it. I do respect [the fact] that these artists were good comrades in arms, despite differences when Korean artists doing abstract or Western-style paintings were considered ludicrous, but they also fought a lot among themselves.

I heard from another collector that you recently began to collect antique Korean art. What was your motivation?

I got curious about what influenced artists I like, so it was natural to move to antique Korean art. The fastest way to learn about antique art is to pay for it, keep looking [at it] and touching it, and wonder why it is done that way. While doing this, I also bought a fake. Well, I think I did because professors and researchers who are much better than me said so. But even if it’s a fake, it’s okay. It’s part of paying for a lesson. Now that I’m in, I cannot pull back. Touching and feeling things that are oxidized, things that have seen better days, I feel like something of their soul seeps into my body.

Famous painters from the Joseon Dynasty, such as Gyeomjae, Danwon, Chusa, and Neunghokwan had different lives and trajectories. Some people lived as court painters, some took [up] a vocation to draw paintings of aristocrats, and some gave up everything and went down to the countryside to paint, projecting their minds onto pine trees. I find it fascinating, because it feels like the answer sheet for how I should live as an artist.

What can you tell us about the next project you’re working on?

Largely, it is going in the opposite direction of Indigo, but it’s not just lighthearted and fun. When people see me, they think I’m a very serious, gentle, and nice person, but I’m not just that. There are many aspects of me that aren’t so serious. I also like making people laugh.