Price
₩500,000
Art protects art
8 out of 10
artists are shut out by banks
354
loans extended to fellow artists
95%
repayment rate — trust comes full circle
~KRW 140M
interest saved vs. predatory rates
Until the next exhibition, the next performance. For artists, income gaps are an unavoidable reality. For fellow artists forced into predatory loans just to afford paint, canvas, and studio rent, proceeds from this artwork become the Seed Fund — extending a fair hand at fair rates.
Voices of fellow artists
“The memory of going hungry for three days, alone, so my children wouldn't know.”
— 50s, theater artist
“I've been putting off urgent dental treatment because I can't afford it. I should be seeing a doctor regularly, but enduring instead of going has become a habit.”
— 50s, actor
“I kept delaying ear treatment because I had no money, and the symptoms in both ears worsened.”
— 30s, musician
“I couldn't pay my hospitalized mother's bills, so we had to delay her discharge, and she had to give up tests and treatment she needed.”
— 50s, actor/broadcaster
“Because of money troubles I had nowhere to go — drifting between gosiwon rooms and rehearsal studios, and for a while sleeping rough.”
— 30s, musician
“Because of unpaid rent, my collective was forced to vacate our shared workspace and home. Neither bank loans nor artist loans could help.”
— 50s, actor
“Without money, life collapses — and creating art? Out of the question.”
— 50s, artist
“It's painful that solving this month's money problems has to come before the work itself. As an artist, I can only earn well when the work succeeds — yet I have to chase odd jobs every month instead. It feels like being trapped in a vicious cycle.”
— 40s, musician
“Debt collection calls disrupted my rehearsals and performances, and the psychological burden made every day painful and the next day frightening.”
— 40s, theater artist
“Many times the loan payments looming each month forced me to step away from performing and focus on part-time work.”
— 50s, actor
“Sleeping less than four hours a night, juggling part-time jobs and theater — but the more I performed, the more debt piled up. Eventually I decided to quit performing.”
— 30s, actor
“When things were hardest, I couldn't even attend close friends' weddings or funerals — and as a result, relationships were severed.”
— 50s, actor/broadcaster
“When I said I was a stage actor, the loan officer called me "unemployed."”
— 50s, actor
“The shame and severed friendships that came with borrowing from people I knew, the pressure of failing to pay it back, the helplessness.”
— 50s, cartoonist/visual artist
“Even with programs meant for low-income citizens, I feel shame when I can't produce enough documentation simply because I'm an artist.”
— 30s, film/broadcasting professional
68 artworks sold, each becoming a seed of solidarity
One artwork becomes the oxygen that keeps a fellow artist creating.
Sales proceeds go to the artist mutual-aid fund.
Gate of Hell
Salnus
About the Artist
Salnus is a Seoul-based painting and drawing artist. Having experimented with various media including painting, drawing, installation, and animation, he has recently focused his practice on painting and drawing. His work repeatedly engages with geometric structures, transparent objects, spheres and circular forms, and distorted images of the body, addressing voyeurism, the grotesque, and the relationship between 'being seen and being concealed' as major themes. Through transparent materials such as glass, crystal spheres, and semi-translucent structures combined with geometric forms, Salnus has consistently juxtaposed the tensions between decorativeness and violence, order and instability within his canvases. Moving between painting and installation, flat surface and three-dimensional form, narrative and structure, he is interested in constructing an image world that is both sensory and structural. Based in Seoul, he has participated in numerous curated exhibitions since his solo show Reverse Pursuit (2014). Recently, through expanded installations of past drawings and sketches and the serial work The Story of the Snake Following the Marble, he has been developing a practice that weaves flat and three-dimensional elements and the entire exhibition space into a single narrative structure.
About this work
〈Gate of Hell〉 is a Painting work by Salnus. Created in 2023 on Acrylic on canvas, measuring 26x41cm. Available as an original Korean contemporary artwork at SAF Online.
Key Career Highlights
Education
2013 B.F.A., Department of Textile Art & Fashion Design, College of Fine Arts, Hongik University
Solo Exhibitions
2025 <Digging Out>, Rounded Flat, Jun 27-30, Seoul
2024 <Bad Taste>, Gallery Moss, May 24-31, Seoul
2022 <Story of a Ring Worm>, Peace Culture Jinji, Seoul, Oct 22-Nov 4
2022 <Overpainted Zone>, Goyang Aram Nuri, Goyang, Jul 27-31
2022 <Entrance>, Gallery Cafe Gaze, Seoul, Apr 20-May 8
2021 <Fragment of the Screen>, Horanggasinamu Creative Space, Gwangju, Nov 16-22
2021 <Genesis Garden - Gaze Beyond Focus>, Wumin Art Center, Cheongju, Sep 20-Nov 6
2020 <Genesis Garden - Inverted Clock>, Goyang Aram Nuri Museum, Goyang
2020 <Genesis Garden>, Yeongcheon Art Creative Studio, Yeongcheon
2018 <Not Unpleasant>, Gallery Binkan, Seoul
2014 <Reverse Chase>, Gallery Gaia, Seoul
Group Exhibitions
2025 <Landscape-Still Life>, N2 Art Space, Seoul, Jun 27-Jul 19
2025 <Tongue of Oblivion, Burning Eyes>, Art Space Raph, Seoul, Mar 14-Apr 5
2024 <Songdo Wandering>, Art Space In, Songdo, Oct 27-Nov 1
2024 <Demon's Tail>, Gallery Horton, Aug 6-31
2024 <PROSPECT24>, Gallery Dehwite, Seoul, Feb 16-Mar 15
2023 <UNDER THE SURFACE>, Horanggasinamu Creative Space, Gwangju, Dec 15-Jan 15
2023 <Room 360>, Online Platform 'Spatial', Oct 25-Dec 31
2023 <Expanding Landscape>, Goyang Aram Nuri Museum, Goyang, Oct 5-13
2023 <The Medium Is the Massage>, Collabo House Mullae, Seoul, Feb 22-27
2022 <Pretzel>, Gallery Gaze, Seoul, Dec 14-31
2022 <Yeonseoksan Horanggasinamu>, Yeonseoksan Woosong Museum, Oct 1-28
2022 <Together with Tiger>, Art District P, Busan, Sep 20-Oct 1
2022 <Simultaneous>, Gallery Gaze, Gallery Moss, Gallery Choyeon, Jun 2-12
2022 <Realistic Dreamers>, Gallery Moss, Seoul, Apr 19-25
2022 <Museum Contemplating Nature>, Goyang Aram Nuri Museum, Apr 13-May 25
2022 <Synthesis of Relations>, Horanggasinamu Creative Space, Gwangju, Mar 15-31
2021 <With>, Horanggasinamu Creative Space, Gwangju
2021 <I Too Am an Art Collector>, Goyang Aram Nuri Museum, Goyang
2021 <Story of a Miner>, Horanggasinamu Creative Space, Gwangju
2021 <Trouble in Paradise>, Round Them Oranges, Jaipur
2020 <Shadow of Perception>, Sian Museum of Art, Yeongcheon
2019 <Drawing on Paper>, Art Space Seoro, Seoul
2018 <Man>, Space Illi, Seoul
2018 <Landscape>, Gallery Birch, Seoul
2017 <Painter's Self-Portrait>, Dooin Gallery, Seoul
2017 <Cloudy and Slow>, Beoplyeonsa Bulil Museum of Art, Seoul
2016 <What Is Art?>, Banditraso, Seoul
2016 <Group 23.5 Degrees>, Duru Art Space, Seoul
2015 <Group 23.5 Degrees>, Gallery Cheong / Gana Art Space / Gallery Imaju, Seoul
2013 <2013 Tetsuson>, Gallery BankART, Yokohama
2012 <Today's Hongik Textile Art Curated Invitational>, KEPCO Art Center Gallery, Seoul
2012 <Goodness>, Seoul Museum of Art Gyeonghuigung Branch, Seoul
2011 <I>, Golden Tower Gallery, Seoul
Residencies
2022 Peace Culture Jinji 5th Cohort Resident Artist
2021 Horanggasinamu Creative Space 7th Cohort Resident Artist
2020 Yeongcheon Art Creative Studio 12th Cohort Short-term Resident Artist
Related materials
Magazine
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Apr 20, 2026 · Seed Art Festival
Contemporary Art Pricing — Artist, Medium, Size, Date: 4 Factors of Korean Art Market
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May 2, 2026 · Seed Art FestivalPurchase Safety
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Two beginnings made by one piece
- For you —
- One-of-a-kind in the world
- For the artist —
- the next month of their practice
- For a fellow artist —
- a new ₩3,000,000 path of low-interest support
354 artists have walked this path of recovery; 95% returned to open it for the next.