On September 17, the Busan Museum of Art held a reopening ceremony, marking the completion of a large-scale renovation that had been carried out over approximately two years and announcing a new chapter for the museum.
 
Since opening in 1998, the museum has served as a cultural hub in Busan, organizing approximately 330 exhibitions through 2023, along with a wide range of educational programs and lectures, performances, and online exhibitions.
 
With a total project budget of approximately KRW 46.9 billion, the museum undertook comprehensive improvements to its facilities and created new spaces for visitors.
 
Major upgrades include the installation of temperature and humidity control systems, the consolidation and reorganization of exhibition galleries, expansion of storage facilities, additional visitor amenities such as a café, reorientation of the main entrance, and redevelopment of the outdoor sculpture park.
 
These improvements strengthen the museum’s core functions, including the preservation of its collection and archival materials, while also reconfiguring the exhibition galleries, Children’s Gallery, visitor rest areas, and outdoor sculpture park as flexible spaces connected both vertically and horizontally.

What makes the reopening noteworthy is not simply the transformation of the museum’s physical spaces. The renovation has also prompted the museum to reconsider its role and future direction.
 
Moving beyond its function as a place to view artworks, the museum is preparing to become a platform where citizens and society, technology and nature are connected, and where new possibilities are created together.
 
Four exhibitions are being presented to coincide with the reopening. These exhibitions will be the first to demonstrate the museum’s transformation and new direction.
 
Spanning international and local perspectives, as well as exhibition spaces and artistic genres, they present diverse approaches to the museum’s evolving role and possibilities in contemporary art.
 
The first international exhibition, 《Future Museology》, explores new roles for museums in collaboration with a consortium of nine museums from Korea and abroad.
 
Moving beyond the traditional functions of collecting and exhibiting artworks, the exhibition examines how museums can engage with society and expand as public spaces. It also presents a direction for the Busan Museum of Art as it responds to changing practices among museums around the world.

An exhibition exploring art and history is also being presented. 《Still We are Borne on These Waves: 1945–1953》 examines the social realities of the period from the liberation of Korea in 1945 through the years surrounding the Korean War, bringing together artworks and archival materials.
 
The exhibition brings together approximately 260 artworks and 460 archival materials from the museum’s collection, as well as holdings of major museums and art museums in Korea, artists and their families, and private collectors.
 
By bringing into dialogue the perspectives of artists who lived through the period with interpretations by contemporary artists, the exhibition seeks to confront the processes through which Korean society was shaped after liberation.
 
In particular, materials from art exhibitions held in Busan during the liberation period will be made public, offering a closer look at the activities of the first generation of Busan painters.

The museum’s own history is also revisited through a dedicated exhibition. 《Dear All the Yesterdays》 traces how the museum’s spaces and meanings have evolved over time, drawing on institutional and architectural records accumulated from its opening to its reopening.
 
Viewing the museum as a space that has changed alongside shifts in society and the times, the exhibition reexamines the longstanding relationship between the museum and Busan’s art ecosystem through materials from the museum’s collection and archives.
 
The ways in which children experience the museum are also being expanded. 《Safe Base》 is designed around attachment theory, allowing children to experience the museum as a space of attachment. Rather than simply viewing artworks, children are encouraged to experience emotional stability and sensory development through play and sensory engagement.

In particular, the exhibition offers children growing up in today’s AI-driven environment opportunities to build relationships with nonhuman beings through play. In doing so, it is expected to serve as an educational institution that helps children discover and express their own senses and emotions.
 
Busan Mayor Jeon Jae-soo said, “The newly renovated Busan Museum of Art will now be closer to citizens. We will carefully cultivate it into a museum that citizens will want to visit often to enjoy art up close, and one they will want to recommend to others as a place to visit together.”

References

• 부산시립미술관 보도자료 (Busan Museum of Art Press Release)