Launched in Seoul in 2022, the “UNBOXING PROJECT (UBP)” is based on the premise of a “Small Scale.” Each edition poses a single theme and commissions new works from Korean artists across generations and media, focusing on the act of close observation rather than grand devices or spectacle. It is an ongoing curatorial experiment grounded in intimacy and precision.
 
The intent of the project was already evident in its inaugural exhibition, 《Today》(2022), which emphasized the sensibility of the present over grand narratives and personal gestures over sweeping declarations—proposing that “a small gesture can shift a viewer’s perception.”
 
Since then, UBP has expanded its trajectory with each edition, reconfiguring its format every time. 《Portable Gallery》(2023) explored the concept of a “traveling gallery,” testing how each artist could condense their universe onto a small canvas. The exhibition, presented at New Spring Project in Seoul, featured an expanded generational and stylistic lineup.

In 2024, UBP made its first overseas debut at Various Small Fires (VSF) in Los Angeles with its fourth edition. While maintaining the project’s core grammar—“Multiple generations of artists responding to a single prompt”—the exhibition experimented with shifting locations and audiences, expanding the interpretive scope.

In the spring of 2025, the project traveled to Berlin. 《MESSAGE》(Mar 20–Apr 12, 2025) took place at KÖNIG TELEGRAPHENAMT, a former telecommunication building turned exhibition venue. The show explored the spatial and historical connotations of ‘transmission’ and ‘communication’.
 
Under the unifying theme of “Message,” around twenty new works in small formats were gathered, echoing the site’s historical function. Incorporating the context of the space into the exhibition structure is a key strategy of UBP—one that has proven effective in its international iterations.

By situating “message” within a historic communication building, the exhibition activated the intersection between site and theme, engaging the audience directly. Through its overseas editions, UBP has positioned the question, “Can the diversity of Korean contemporary art be translated through small-scale formats?” within a global context.

Continuing this trajectory, the sixth exhibition, 《Reading》, opens at New Spring Project in Hannam-dong, Seoul.

This edition takes “text” as its subject. Throughout art history, the relationship between text and image has been a productive tension—text can either constrain or liberate the image.

However, “Reading” extends beyond the act of decoding written language. It encompasses the visual grammar of images and the interpretive acts of viewers. Formally, each work adopts a diptych structure joined by a hinge—inviting the viewer to physically “open and close” the artwork, echoing the act of reading.

This physical rhythm of opening and closing shapes the cadence of visual reading, embodying the oscillation between text and image within the exhibition space. Twenty-one newly commissioned works by artists of different generations and media participate within this structure.
 

Viewing Points

1. Diptych as Object: The hinged diptych unfolds like a book, turning “reading” into a spatial, performative act.

2. Boundary of Text and Image: When text becomes material rather than explanation, it generates excess meaning—this exhibition invites the audience to experience that surplus.

3. Continuity Across Editions: The small-format, thought-driven structure accumulated through previous editions reappears here as a reconfigured “apparatus of interpretation.”
 

Exhibition Information

• Venue: New Spring Project, Hannam-dong, Yongsan-gu, Seoul
• Dates: October 23 – November 23, 2025
• Details: Updates on curatorial information and participating artists available on official UBP and New Spring Project channels (Instagram).