Seoul’s National Museum Bets on Blockbusters With Damien Hirst, Do Ho Suh Shows

MMCA launches “Global Focus” for 2026

SEOUL — Korea’s National Museum of Modern and Contemporary Art (MMCA) is turning to blockbuster names to keep its galleries full and its finances steady, unveiling plans for major exhibitions of Damien Hirst and Do Ho Suh as Seoul steps up its bid to become a global art hub.

At a New Year press conference Tuesday at MMCA Seoul in Jongno District, Director Kim Sung-hee said the state museum will launch a new annual “Global Focus” series in 2026, anchored by what she described as Hirst’s first large-scale career survey in Asia in March and a comprehensive Suh retrospective in late August.

The announcement capped a year in which the museum recorded 3.46 million paying visitors across its branches in 2025, the highest in its history, and laid out how it intends to sustain that momentum while operating with a record budget and tighter funds for acquiring art.

“Last year’s response showed that the public has a strong appetite for ambitious, high-quality exhibitions,” Kim said, citing the museum’s Ron Mueck show, which drew more than 530,000 visitors. “With ‘Global Focus,’ we want to continually introduce artists who have defined contemporary art, and at the same time critically examine their impact.”

A tentpole strategy—and higher ticket tiers

The Mueck exhibition—a solo show of the Australian-born sculptor’s hyperreal figures—cost about 3 billion won to stage and generated roughly 2.5 billion won in ticket revenue, according to the museum. That near break-even result has become a model for MMCA’s new strategy: invest heavily in a handful of large-scale “tentpole” shows with higher admission fees that can, in theory, subsidize the rest of its programming.

Under a universal paid-admission policy introduced in 2023, MMCA now charges 2,000 won for standard shows and roughly 5,000 won—its highest tier—for large-scale exhibitions such as Mueck’s and the upcoming Hirst retrospective.

Kim said the museum plans to spend around 3 billion won on the Hirst show and expects to recover more than half that amount through ticket sales. “Any surplus ultimately returns to the museum and the state,” she said, framing the exhibition as a revenue-generating project within a public mandate.

Hirst in Seoul: spectacle, controversy, and critique

Hirst, a leading figure among the Young British Artists who emerged in London in the late 1980s, is known for works that place animals in formaldehyde tanks, cabinets filled with pharmaceuticals and the diamond-encrusted human skull “For the Love of God.” His exhibition at MMCA Seoul will bring together more than 50 works spanning his career, including pieces from the “Natural History” series and a version of the skull, alongside paintings and installations.

Kim acknowledged that Hirst’s work is “always accompanied by controversy,” from long-running debates over animal ethics to criticism of his close ties to the art market and the role of assistants in fabricating his works. She argued, however, that these very issues justify presenting his work in a state institution.

“Hirst has persistently questioned our relationship with death and the mechanisms of capital, science and systems of authority that surround it,” she said. “As a national museum, we have a responsibility not only to show influential figures to domestic audiences but also to re-examine their significance in contemporary art and art-market capitalism from a critical standpoint.”

Do Ho Suh retrospective timed for Seoul’s fall art season

If Hirst imports a familiar figure of Western art spectacle to Seoul, the museum’s other 2026 flagship exhibition centers on one of Korea’s best-known contemporary artists abroad. The late-August retrospective of Suh Do-ho—who works internationally as Do Ho Suh—will be the first of its scale in his home country, MMCA officials said.

Born in Seoul in 1962 and educated at Seoul National University and Yale University, Suh is widely recognized for translucent fabric reconstructions of homes and corridors he has lived in, as well as drawings and installations that examine themes of home, displacement and collective identity. The MMCA show will bring together large fabric “architecture” works and what the museum described as a substantial body of drawings, many of which have not been shown in Korea at this scale.

“Suh is now in his 60s, with enough layers and depth in his practice for a full retrospective,” Kim said. “We expect his exhibition, especially as it opens into the autumn art season, to draw our largest audience this year.”

The Suh show is scheduled to open in late August at MMCA Seoul and run into September, overlapping with Frieze Seoul—the international art fair returning to the capital in early September—and the Gwangju and Busan Biennales, which also open that month. The timing underlines how closely MMCA is coordinating its calendar with the broader art ecosystem as Seoul competes with cities such as Hong Kong and Shanghai for international attention.

Record budget, shrinking acquisition funds

The museum’s blockbuster strategy comes against the backdrop of a significant increase in public funding. MMCA’s budget will rise about 23 percent this year, from 69.1 billion won in 2025 to 84.8 billion won in 2026, the largest allocation since the museum’s founding. At the same time, the amount set aside to buy artworks will fall from 4.7 billion won to 4.0 billion won, extending a downward trend in acquisition spending.

Kim said the higher operating budget would support large-scale exhibitions and a new 5 billion won initiative to tour MMCA shows to regional museums around the country, including displays of major Korean modern artists such as Lee Jung-seop.

“We are strengthening our role as a national institution not only in Seoul but across the country, by sharing our content more actively with regional museums and audiences,” she said.

The combination of higher exhibition spending, a formal blockbuster series and declining acquisition funds raises questions for some observers about how public museums balance short-term attendance goals with long-term collection building. MMCA did not outline specific acquisition targets for 2026, but officials emphasized that the museum’s four sites—in Seoul, Gwacheon, Deoksugung and Cheongju—would continue research and collection projects alongside major temporary shows.

A crowded field of new institutions

The 2026 program also unfolds amid intensifying institutional competition. Centre Pompidou Hanwha Seoul, a satellite venue of Paris’ Centre Pompidou developed with Hanwha Group, is scheduled to open in May in the 63 Building in Yeouido after earlier delays. The Seoul Museum of Art plans to launch a new Seo-Seoul branch in the city’s western area in the first half of the year, focusing on performance and media art. Major private museums, including Leeum Museum of Art and Amorepacific Museum of Art, have lined up their own international exhibitions.

By moving to brand and publicize an annual “Global Focus” series, MMCA appears intent on reinforcing its position as the country’s flagship public art institution in a crowded field that increasingly includes global franchises and corporate-backed museums.

For visitors, the most visible change will likely be on the walls and at the ticket counter. Since 2023, a visit to any MMCA branch has required a paid ticket, and high-cost blockbusters such as Hirst’s are priced more than double regular exhibitions. Museum officials argue that the system keeps general admission low while allowing expensive shows to help cover their costs.

As 2026 begins, that approach will soon be tested. Hirst’s formaldehyde tanks and diamond skull—symbols of a particular era’s blend of mortality, science and money—will share the calendar with Suh’s ghostly fabric corridors, which trace the movements of a Korean artist between Seoul, New York and London. Together, they will serve as MMCA’s most visible statement this year of how a national museum can use global names to draw crowds, manage public money and place Seoul more firmly on the contemporary art map.