Somin Kim Young-hee_Guhyeon Seoga A-02 Accumulation A-03 Accumulation _ Pomegranate Watermelon

At Muusu Gallery in Insadong, Seoul, from the 1st through the 13th, two exhibitions are underway: the two-artist collaborative show ‘Guhyeon Seoga’, featuring minhwa artist Somin Kim Young-hee and object artist 2Myoung, and the invited solo exhibition by 2Myoung, ‘Afterimages of Longing’.

On the third floor of the gallery, the two-artist collaboration ‘Guhyeon Seoga’ by minhwa artist Somin Kim Young-hee and object artist 2Myoung is on view, while on the fourth floor the invited solo exhibition by 2Myoung, ‘Afterimages of Longing’, is being held. Both shows also present new works, allowing visitors to encounter in one place a practice that crosses traditional painting and popular culture, two-dimensional and three-dimensional.

The third-floor exhibition ‘Guhyeon Seoga’ starts from the traditional painting ‘chaekgado’. Chaekgado is a painting that brings books and objects, flowers and fruit together on a single picture plane.

The exhibition begins with a scene of small sparrows flying into that bookshelf. The sparrows stroll across the books to find the first sentence, whisper stories, and leave tiny footprints on paper.

Somin Kim Young-hee_Traditional chaekgado two-panel screen _ 15 objects

Somin Kim Young-hee, who unfolds this scene in painting, is an artist who has combined the formative qualities of minhwa with contemporary sensibilities, based on traditional formats such as hwajodo·munjado·chaekgeori.

Through collaborations with Warner Bros., the Constitutional Court of Korea, and Austria LEITNER LEINEN, she has expanded new possibilities for minhwa, and she now runs Studio SOMIN, continuing exhibitions and international exchange shows in Korea and abroad.

2Myoung, who calls into real space the objects that had stayed inside paintings, is an artist who has focused on objects and designer toys, recombining familiar images and memories in new ways.

Reinterpreting characters and things from popular culture such as film, comics, and toys through a personal gaze, the artist has built a world where familiarity and strangeness coexist through signature series like BeBeams·Banaduck·Dunkeys.

‘Guhyeon Seoga(具現書架)’ poster

In ‘Guhyeon Seoga’, the artist realizes as three-dimensional objects the things that had remained inside chaekgado, carrying the scenery of the bookshelf into real space.

On the fourth floor, the invited solo exhibition by 2Myoung, ‘Afterimages of Longing’, unfolds. It is the second chapter of the ‘Playtime’s not over!‘ series, which debuted in 2025, beginning from hazy images that have long lingered in the mind.

The artist focuses on worlds that feel real after only a few glimpses on TV or in books, and on images that were never mine yet remain for a long time. It is a sentiment close to nostalgia for a time never experienced, the so-called anemoia(anemoia).

This approach is also linked to the artist background. 2Myoung has worked at the center of popular culture, moving across character·illustration·interactive media, including the SK Telecom ‘June’ advertising mascot and the design of the first official Gundam website in Korea.

2Myoung_Shoot Toward Tomorrow 01,02,03 80.3x80.3cm, acrylic paint, arches paper, 2026

In ‘Afterimages of Longing’, the gaze directed at images long consumed and made familiar shifts into traces of emotion.

The objects and paintings on view are not simple reproductions; they are traces of feeling toward what has passed by, what could not be reached, and what in the end was never mine.

The artist braids those emotions and memories with a mix and match approach, allowing things familiar yet old to greet us anew with fresh impressions.

While the two exhibitions have different textures, they continue in a single flow. On the third floor, in ‘Guhyeon Seoga’, the objects within traditional chaekgado come back to life as painting and object, calling the scenery of the bookshelf into reality, while on the fourth floor, in ‘Afterimages of Longing’, familiar images from popular culture change into traces of emotion.

2Myoung_I‘m not a sidekick! C&M 28x14.9cm, SLA resin,acrylic paint, 2026

Both exhibitions speak to how things that have long stayed in the heart address us again in new forms. The shows are curated so that visitors can fully experience the landscape created as tradition and modernity, painting and object, memory and emotion reflect one another.

Afterimages of Longing poster