Porcelain in spotlight: Kim Jiana redefines VIP space at Frieze Seoul
Summary
Artist Kim Jiana took over Frieze Seoul’s Main VIP Lounge in Coex, becoming the first artist to receive the fair’s flagship footprint instead of a commercial sponsor. The installation anchored Frieze Seoul 2026, which closed Saturday after drawing over 70,000 visitors from 54 countries and territories. Kim’s solo commission, INSIDE: The Structure We Live In, used porcelain fragments to create a translucent spatial work. She also has an exhibition, The Theatre of Phantom Organ, running at the Wumin Art Center in Cheongju through Sept. 19.
Key Facts
- Frieze Seoul 2026 featured 133 galleries from 30 countries and representatives from 178 international museums and institutions.
- Opening-day VIP preview attendance rose by more than 10 percent from last year.
- The Main VIP Lounge at The Platz covered 826 square meters and was directly managed by Frieze for Kim Jiana’s commission.
- Kim’s porcelain pieces are fired at approximately 1,300 degrees Celsius and then stacked and linked into thousands of individual elements.
Artist Kim Jiana
Inside the bustling halls of Coex, artist Kim Jiana accomplished something unprecedented for Asia’s premier art market.
Winner of the 24th Wumin Art Award in 2025, Kim took over the entirety of Frieze Seoul’s Main VIP Lounge, marking the first time the global art fair handed its flagship footprint to a single artist rather than a commercial sponsor.
The installation anchored a powerhouse four days for Frieze Seoul 2026, which closed Saturday after drawing over 70,000 visitors from 54 countries and territories. Since launching its Seoul edition in 2022, the fair has cemented the capital's status as a global art capital. This year’s event featured 133 galleries from 30 countries and representatives from 178 international museums and institutions, with opening-day VIP preview attendance climbing more than 10 percent from last year.
While partner brands like Shinsegae, BMW, LG U+, Aman and American Express designed their own branded lounges throughout the venue, Frieze directly managed the 826-square-meter Main VIP Lounge at The Platz to showcase Kim’s solo commission, "INSIDE: The Structure We Live In."
Kim’s labor-intensive technique transforms porcelain into delicate, paper-thin fragments. After hand-shaping the raw clay, she fires the pieces at approximately 1,300 degrees Celsius before stacking and linking thousands of individual elements together. The extreme heat renders the porcelain both structurally resilient and translucent, capturing ambient light in shifting patterns based on the density and overlap of the fragments — a process Kim describes as "painting light with clay."
Rather than treating art as a static object, she frames her practice around the concept of "Spatial Painting." Her work rejects traditional two-dimensional canvases, relying instead on the fluid relationships among physical material, natural light, surrounding environment, time and the physical presence of the viewer.
"For me, painting is no longer an image fixed to a wall," Kim said. "Material encounters light, space and people, continually transforming and coming into being anew."
Art enthusiasts looking to see more of her practice can view her work outside the capital: Kim’s award-winning solo exhibition, "The Theatre of Phantom Organ," runs at the Wumin Art Center in Cheongju through Sept. 19.
This article was published with the assistance of generative AI and edited by The Korea Times.
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