Namhee Park Appointed Director of Nam June Paik Art Center

The Nam June Paik Art Center in Youngin, South Korea, has revealed Namhee Park as its new director. Park, who has long been deeply enmeshed in the country’s art scene, arrives to the job from Hongik University, from which she recently obtained her PhD in art studies, and where she has since 2021 been a visiting professor at the Graduate School of Visual Communication. Having officially stepped into her new role this past September, she replacesSeong Eun Kim, who had led the institution since 2019.

Park launched her career in 1998 as an adjunct professor at Seoul National University of Science and Technology, remaining at her post there through 2005. From 2016 to 2020, she served as director of the education department at Gwangju’s ACC Asia Culture Institute; in 2018, she added the role of head of exhibitions at the Asia Culture Center’s ACT Festival, which she held through 2019, during which year she also served as artistic director of the Twenty-Fifth International Symposium on Electronic Art. Park in 2022 curated the Third Jeju Biennale.RelatedITALIAN GOVERNMENT BEGINS SIFTING OUT FOREIGN MUSEUM DIRECTORSBRITISH MUSEUM ANNOUNCES BP-FUNDED REFURBISHMENT “At a time when the value of world peace is required more than ever, I look forward to presenting an open and inclusive institution, just as Nam June Paik had done in perceiving the future of humanity and technology with warm eyes and presenting diverse works,” said Park in a statement.

Park has outlined three goals for the center, which next year will present “Good Morning, Mr. Orwell,” celebrating the fortieth anniversary of Paik’s historic satellite television show. The first of these is the establishment of a “hyperconnected” shared platform as a public forum aimed at the exhibition and research of art and technology; the second is the reevaluation, through collaboration with artists and institutions around the globe, of Paik’s art as a public asset; and the third is to advocate for the values Paik held close, among them peace, acceptance, and solidarity..