What Did Collectors Make of Art Busan 2024?

Busan Follow +

Prominent Korean collectors Ryu Jihye and Youngsang Lee offered their impressions of this year’s fair and revealed artists they adore.

Art Busan wrapped its 13th edition over the weekend with galleries reporting steady sales.

Lee Bae‘s charcoal sculptures at Johyun Gallery sold out within the first hour of opening, and Tang Contemporary Art found buyers for works by Yue Minjun, Woo Kukwon, and Chun Kwang Young.

Kukje Gallery sold Heejoon Lee‘s Into the Nebulae (2023) for around U.S. $18,000 and Ha Chong-Hyun‘s Conjunction 22-79 (2022) for approximately U.S. $250,000, while Tokyo’s Biscuit Gallery sold a large number of paintings featuring a tender cloud character by Japanese artist Miyu Yamada.

The number of participants was lowered from 146 last year to 129, allowing for bigger booths and more room between them.

Ryu Jihye, a 51-year-old collector who lives in Seoul but keeps a house in Busan for her collection—visiting roughly once a month to water her plants and share her artworks with friends—described this year’s fair as ‘spacious’.

‘There are new artists and new artworks,’ she said. ‘There are many lesser-known spaces in Korea and it seems that some of them are here today. This will be good for art lovers in Busan. I’m the type to roam around, finding hidden gems, but not everyone will go out of their way to do that.’

Among the artists she’s watching is Hyeok Lee, who escaped from North Korea in 2006 and showed at the fair with Seoul’s Duson Gallery.

‘His paintings are so vigorous and spirited,’ Ryu said. ‘They’ve got a whole different energy from works by South Korean artists.’

Ryu also expressed her admiration for Mire Lee, whose work Ryu added to her collection of works by Hito Steyerl, Choi Daejin, and Stanislava Kovalcikova last year.

Youngsang Lee, a 38-year-old collector who first visited the fair in 2018, said he was impressed by Chinese artist Lu Yang, whose work was presented by Berlin gallery SOCIÉTÉ.

‘The artist’s DOKU the Self (2022) at this year’s Art Busan was brilliant,’ he said. ‘It was a fantastic opportunity to immerse oneself in their potent images on a large screen.’

Both collectors said they enjoyed spending time in Busan.

‘It’s rare that a city has everything that nature can offer: the sea, the river, the mountain; then there’s also the city itself and the local food,’ Ryu said.

‘I am drawn to Busan’s local colours. You can’t sip coffee or wine on a seaside terrace in Seoul,’ Lee added. ‘All in all it feels like going to a resort during fair season; everyone’s relaxed and at ease.’

The colourful attractions of Busan made room for leisurely encounters with CONNECT, Art Busan’s exhibition programme consisting of nine sections this year. Henna Joo, professor at Hongik University and former global director of ARARIO, was the first director of the programme.

The curated group exhibition HERSTORY paid attention to regional feminist history and intersectional feminism by bringing together works of Yayoi Kusama, Jung Kang Ja, Xiao Lu, Cindy Sherman, and Jenny Holzer, while FOCUS ASIA: China highlighted the Chinese avantgarde including Zhu Jinshi, Yan Lei, and Ma Shuqing.

Solo presentations also attracted a stream of curious visitors, such as John Giorno‘s DIAL-A-POEM (Push-Button Edition) (1958–2019), co-presented by Galerie Eva Presenhuber and Giorno Poetry Systems, which involved dialing a random number to hear a recital of a poem by anonymous artists, poets, and activists. —[O]

Main image: Art Busan 2024. Courtesy Art Busan.