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Busan Museum of Art: Together Again - Reopening Tomorrow, September 17!

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Busan Museum of Art (hereinafter the "Museum") has completed approximately two years of major renovation and will hold a reopening ceremony tomorrow, September 17, at 5:00 p.m. in the Museum's first-floor lobby.

Approximately 300 people will attend the ceremony, including Mayor Chun Jae-soo, participating artists and bereaved family members, representatives of related institutions, members of the Museum's support association, and leading figures from the cultural community. Together, they will mark the renewed Museum's new beginning and share its vision for the future.

Since opening in 1998 through 2023, the Museum has organized approximately 330 exhibitions, as well as a wide range of educational programs, lectures, performances, and online exhibitions, serving as a cultural hub of Busan.

The Museum invested approximately KRW 46.9 billion to upgrade its facilities comprehensively and create new spaces for visitors.

Major improvements include the installation of a constant temperature and humidity control system, consolidation and renovation of exhibition galleries, expansion of collection storage, additional visitor amenities including a cafe, reorientation of the main entrance, and redevelopment of the outdoor sculpture park.

These improvements strengthen the Museum's core functions, including the preservation of its collection and archival materials, while vertically and horizontally connecting the exhibition galleries, Children's Gallery, visitor rest areas, and outdoor sculpture park to create flexible, versatile spaces.

With its reopening, the Museum plans to expand its role beyond a place for viewing art into a platform where citizens and society, technology and nature come together to create new possibilities.

The first international exhibition to embody this vision, Future Museology, is organized in collaboration with a network of nine museums in Korea and abroad. Moving beyond the traditional functions of collecting and exhibiting artworks, it explores how museums can engage with society and expand into public forums. By examining changing trends among museums around the world, the exhibition also proposes directions for the Museum's future.

The Museum will also present special exhibitions examining the development of Korean society and art since liberation and reflecting on the Museum's own history.

Still We Are Borne on These Waves: 1945-1953 examines social realities from immediately after Korea's liberation in 1945 through the period surrounding the Korean War through artworks and archival materials. Featuring approximately 260 works and some 460 archival materials from the Museum's collection, major museums in Korea, artists and bereaved family members, and private collectors, the exhibition explores the formation of Korean society following liberation through the perspectives of artists of the time and interpretations by contemporary artists.

In particular, the exhibition presents archival materials related to art exhibitions held in Busan during the liberation period, offering insight into the activities of Busan's first generation of painters.

Dear All The Yesterdays draws on institutional and architectural records and collection resources accumulated from the Museum's opening through its reopening to examine how the Museum's spaces and meanings have changed over time. It also reflects on the long-standing relationship between the Museum and Busan's art ecosystem.

An exhibition designed to offer children a new way to experience the Museum will also be presented.

Safe Base, presented in the Children's Gallery, is based on attachment theory and designed to help children experience the Museum as a place to which they can form an emotional attachment. Beyond viewing artworks, children are encouraged to discover and express their own senses and emotions through play and sensory experiences.

For today's children growing up in an artificial intelligence environment, the exhibition particularly proposes playful experiences of forming relationships with non-human beings, enabling them to experience emotional stability and sensory development.

Ahead of the reopening ceremony, the Museum will fully open its newly renovated facilities and reopening special exhibitions to the public from 10:00 a.m. tomorrow, September 17.

More information on the reopening special exhibitions and visiting the Museum is available on the Museum's website at https://art.busan.go.kr.

Mayor Chun Jae-soo said, "The newly renovated Busan Museum of Art will now come closer to citizens," adding, "We will carefully cultivate it into a museum people will want to visit often to enjoy art up close, and one they will want to invite someone else to visit with them."