Kim Hoseong ran a 24-hour unattended gallery with monthly exhibitions. History-major-turned-photographer; the *Stickerture* series views stickers as a model of modern identity.
Kim Hoseong's record has one unusual line. In 2018–2019, he ran an unattended gallery accessible 24 hours a day, holding a new exhibition each month. Monthly Project. In a space without a key or caretaker, new conceptual works took their seats each month.
The artist directly running the space and releasing his work. That posture — gradually blurring boundaries between exhibition and audience, artist and space — has continued since.
A Photographer From History
Kim Hoseong graduated in history from Kyung Hee University, then again from photography at Chung-Ang University. Moving majors from history to photography. Both disciplines share a common ground of record.
Early work took photography and video as a base, addressing contemporary desire and wandering. 2011 New Generation Art Stars (Seoul Arts Center Hangaram), 2012 9th Busan International Video Art Festival (Busan Museum of Art), 2012 Politics of Memory (Jaha Museum), 2013 Animamix Biennale (Daegu Art Museum). He passed through many platforms of Korean media art and photography early on.
From Washington to DDP
A thick record of domestic and international group shows.
- 2016 Seen vs Shown, Korean Cultural Center Washington, USA
- 2016 Hello Media Art, KT Imagination Madang, Seoul
- 2016 1st K-foto Festival BUFF, BEXCO, Busan
- 2017 ASYAAF 2017, DDP, Seoul
- 2018 New York New York New York, Art Space J
- 2024 KTX 20th Anniversary — Beyond the Journey, Culture Station 284, Seoul
A consistent experimentation across media boundaries. For Kim Hoseong, photography isn't a fixed genre but a tool summoned to fit each concept.
Surfaces of Time, and Wild Grasses
His solo titles over the last three years reveal his thought.
- 2023 Surfaces of Time, CICA Museum, Gyeonggi
- 2025 This Is Not an Exhibition, N2 ART SPACE, Seoul
- 2025 Wild Grasses Grow Any Way They Want, Rigak Museum, Cheonan
This Is Not an Exhibition immediately recalls Magritte's Ceci n'est pas une pipe. Wild Grasses Grow Any Way They Want is a posture opposite an ordered garden. His recent practice moves toward facing boundary and randomness.
Stickerture, a Gaze of Compassion
Two SAF 2026 works are both from the Stickerture series.
- Inviting — 2011, pigment print on diasec, 30×45 cm
- Time to lose — 2011, pigment print on diasec, 30×45 cm
The artist's words.
"Stickers that felt cute and friendly in childhood now, to an adult artist facing reality, feel rather unnatural — artificial smiles, exaggerated costumes, stereotyped poses. The artist regards this sensibility not as critique but as compassion, finding a kinship with himself within it. A sticker carries the passivity of being attached by another, and at the same time the activity of covering and defining an object. Yet the moment it peels off, it loses its function — sometimes leaving only an ineradicable trace…"
This double gaze — passivity and activity — resembles how modern identity works. We are beings defined by others, and at once subjects defining ourselves. And what remains after definition is lifted: an ineradicable trace.
An Extension of the Monthly Project
84.9% of Korean artists are excluded from institutional finance. Sales of works by SAF-exhibiting artists cycle into a mutual-aid fund, returning as low-interest loans to fellow artists.
Kim Hoseong's 24-hour unattended gallery was an experiment in the artist directly making the space. SAF is an experiment in artists taking turns making a space of the fund. Different in scale and purpose, but resembling in that each is a way artists build their own infrastructure outside institutions. One person's experiment expanding into many people's solidarity.
Traces That Don't Erase
A sticker loses its function when peeled — but the trace remains.
A work placed at SAF is similar. The number of a sale ends once, but the trace of solidarity it generates does not erase. When his Inviting and Time to lose stick to someone's wall, what remains there is a record that lasts longer than the sticker.
Works by Kim Hoseong
Related reading
If this piece helped, you may also enjoy these related articles:
- Preparing a Young Artist First Solo Show: A Six-Month Roadmap — A first solo show is a singular threshold in an artist's life. This guide synthesizes emerging artists' experiences into a six-month preparation roadmap.
- Four First-Time Collectors Share Their Stories — The moment of buying a first artwork is different for everyone. A first paycheck, a mother's birthday, a new home after divorce — four collectors who bought their first works through SAF tell their stories.
- Lee Yun-yop — A "Dispatched Artist," Carving the Texture of Labor in Multi-Color Woodblock — Lee Yun-yop, master of Korean multi-color woodblock. "Dispatched artist" activist, industrial rubber matting medium, farmer/worker motifs, MMCA collection — with 5 curated picks.
View all works by Kim Hoseong →
Related Reads
Artists on the Same Path
- 김태균 — Seoul and Pyongyang, Patterns of Two Cities: Kim Taegyun's Ornament
- 안소현 — An Actor's Eye on the City: An Sohyeon's Authentic City
- 최재란 — Between Quarks and Kairos: Choe Jaeran's Suwon, Photographs of Time
Collecting Guides
Seed Art Festival
Published April 20, 2026
