View this press release in: 한국어 (pdf)
The Smithsonian’s National Museum of Asian Art has named Sunwoo Hwang its inaugural Korea Foundation Curator of Korean Art and Culture. Following an international search, Hwang was selected for this role in April 2024. The endowed position is made possible by a matching gift from the Korea Foundation to deepen and make accessible people’s understanding of Korean art and culture; the museum will match the amount to establish a fund for the curatorship. This gift from the Korea Foundation builds upon its long history of support for the museum.
As the museum begins its second century, Hwang will provide the sustained leadership necessary to grow its Korean program and collection and serve as a national and international leader in the study and presentation of Korean art and culture.
Since its founding as the Freer Gallery of Art, the National Museum of Asian Art was one of the first in the United States to display Korean art. As the Korea Foundation Curator of Korean Art and Culture, Hwang will steward the museum’s growing collection of Korean objects—a number of which are the finest examples of their kind outside of Korea. Hwang will reinstall the Korean permanent gallery in the Freer and expand and diversify the museum’s holdings through gifts and purchases. In addition, she will shape a major Korean art loan exhibition already scheduled for 2025–2026 from the National Museum of Korea featuring masterworks recently donated by the family of former Samsung Corp. chairman Lee Kun-hee. Hwang will also create an ambitious and engaging scholarly program and drive innovative cultural programming at the museum.
After serving as the Korea Foundation Global Challenger intern at the National Museum of Asian Art in 2018, Hwang returned to begin a five-year curatorial training fellowship at the museum, which concluded in 2023. During that time she contributed to an array of projects including two exhibitions: “Sacred Dedication: A Korean Buddhist Masterpiece” (2019) and “Once Upon a Roof: Vanished Korean Architecture” (2022). She also translated the publication Research Report on a Seated Wooden Avalokiteshvara (duk 953) (2019) and is currently co-editing with Keith Wilson, the museum’s curator of ancient Chinese art, a research volume titled Korean Buddhist Images and Dedication Practice featuring papers presented at a National Museum of Asian Art symposium in 2020. Hwang received a Master of Arts in humanities from the University of Chicago in 2009 and is currently a doctoral candidate at Dongguk University in Seoul, South Korea, specializing in Buddhist wall paintings in Shanxi province, China.
“Colleagues and I are pleased that Sunwoo is joining our curatorial team,” said Chase F. Robinson, the museum’s director. “Her perspective and contributions will be essential as we build on our ongoing initiative to raise the profile of Korean art and culture in our galleries, programs and public spaces.”
“I thank the Korea Foundation for their generous support that has made this opportunity possible,” Hwang said. “It is an exciting moment to begin this new position as the museum starts its next 100 years with a clear commitment to Korean art and culture.”
Korean Art and Culture Initiatives
Hwang joins the museum at a time when it is expanding its focus on the art and culture of Korea. In April 2023, the Smithsonian Institution signed a memorandum of understanding with the South Korean Ministry of Culture, Sports and Tourism to increase collaboration. Under this umbrella, the National Museum of Asian Art is able to pursue joint projects that build on its long track record of exhibiting Korean art and advancing Korean art scholarship.
In April 2024, the National Museum of Asian Art with support from the Korea Foundation installed a specially commissioned edition of the sculpture “Public Figures” by Korean artist Do Ho Suh in front of the Freer Gallery to celebrate the museum’s centennial. The museum’s latest exhibition “Park Chan-kyong: Gathering” inaugurates its new modern and contemporary galleries with the first solo presentation of Seoul-based artist Park Chan-kyong’s work in a major U.S. museum.
Recent scholarly work includes presenting the symposium Korean Buddhist Images and Dedication Practice (Feb. 20–21, 2020) and the webinar Ancient Korean Architecture in Context (July 26, 2022), hosting Korean Senior Scholar in Residence Professor Kang Bong Won (2022) and producing several publications such as the bilingual digital catalog Goryeo Buddhist Painting: A Closer Look (2019).
With the growing prominence of Korean culture across the globe, the National Museum of Asian Art has increasingly shared its historical art collections alongside Korean popular culture in programming featuring film, food, music and performance. High-profile Korean performers, including Grammy award-winning violinist Jennifer Koh and K-pop artist Eric Nam, were featured during the museum’s centennial celebrations in May 2023, which were attended by more than 40,000 visitors. In September 2023, the museum presented its new annual celebration of Korean art and culture that coincided with the mid-autumn festival Chuseok. It was one of the most well-attended single-day events of the year, with over 5,000 visitors.
About the National Museum of Asian Art
The Smithsonian’s National Museum of Asian Art is committed to preserving, exhibiting, researching and interpreting art in ways that deepen our collective understanding of Asia and the world. Home to more than 46,000 objects, the museum stewards one of North America’s largest and most comprehensive collections of Asian art, with works dating from antiquity to the present from China, Japan, Korea, South Asia, Southeast Asia and the Islamic world. Its rich holdings bring the arts of Asia into direct dialogue with an important collection of 19th- and early 20th-century American works, providing an essential platform for creative collaboration and cultural exchange between the United States, Asia and the Middle East.
Beginning with a 1906 gift that paved the way for the museum’s opening in 1923, the National Museum of Asian Art is a leading resource for visitors, students and scholars in the United States and internationally. Its galleries, laboratories, archives and library are located on the National Mall in Washington, D.C., and are part of the world’s largest museum complex, which typically reports more than 27 million visits each year. The museum is free and open to the public 364 days a year (closed Dec. 25), making its exhibitions, programs, learning opportunities and digital initiatives accessible to global audiences.
For more information about the museum, visit www.asia.si.edu and follow updates on Instagram: @natasianart, Twitter: @NatAsianArt and Facebook: @NatAsianArt.
