Frieze Seoul returned to Gangnam’s COEX center for its fourth edition on September 3rd, bringing together more than 120 galleries from 28 countries. The fair is now an established highlight in a concentrated week of art world activity in the Korean capital. It takes place concurrently with Kiaf SEOUL, the country’s oldest and largest art fair, which is also located in the COEX on a separate floor.
As Frieze’s VIP day unfolded at 11 a.m., a steady—but not overwhelming—crowd greeted its VIP opening. Patrick Lee, the fair’s director, explained that a new time-slot system helped stagger admissions, allowing collectors to enter at a more balanced pace throughout the day. As a result, gallerists had more space and time to speak with clients without feeling rushed in the early hours. As the day progressed, however, so did the crowds, with lines streaming out of the venue by afternoon. Many notable guests were also spotted on the concourses, including artist Mark Bradford, BTS star RM, Lisa from BLACKPINK, and a number of other K-pop icons.
Inflation of Expectations, 2025
Yulia Iosilzon
Carvalho
While some heavyweight galleries have not returned to the fair this year, such as Karma and Michael Werner Gallery, there are a slew of notable first-time exhibitors. These include Hong Kong’s 10 Chancery Lane Gallery and DE SARTHE, New York’s Carvalho, Los Angeles’s Make Room, and W-Galería, the only gallery from Latin America to participate in the event. “We have been participating in Frieze London and have been wanting to expand the market in Asia. Korea is obviously one of the places to be,” said Mia, the gallery’s director.
Like many international exhibitors, W-Galería presented works by an artist with ties to Korea. Its booth featured Jaime Davidovich’s early monochrome works, 23 oil paintings by the late Argentine American artist who was a pioneer in the intersection of art and technology in New York during the 1970s and 1980s. Davidovich was also a close friend of Nam June Paik, one of Korea’s most celebrated artists.
Those in Seoul were also offered a wider range of satellite curatorial events compared to last year, including a packed slate of gallery shows, museum openings, and parties. New this year is Frieze’s first permanent space in Asia, Seoul House, modeled on the success of its London space, No.9 Cork Street. The four-story space will host year-round programming, and this week opened its inaugural exhibition, “Unhouse.” Focused on LGBTQ+ themes, the show brings together artists from across Asia and beyond to showcase the diversity and vibrancy of Korea’s contemporary art scene.
Overall, exhibitors at the fair appeared to strike a balance between presenting experimental works and those more in line with local preferences, ensuring both critical attention and sales potential. Indeed, early reported sales from the fair’s VIP day suggest a strong start to proceedings, with the leading transaction—a $4.5 million Mark Bradford painting—the most expensive ever logged at the fair.
Stay tuned for our full sales report on Monday. Here, we share the 10 best booths from Frieze Seoul 2025.
Hakgojae Gallery
Booth M17
With works by Kim Whanki, Park Soo Keun, Byun Wol-ryong (Pen Varlen), Lee Joon, Ryu Kyung Chai, Nam June Paid, Yun Suknam, Song Hyun-Sook, and Park Young-Ha
Seoul tastemaker Hakgojae Gallery’s booth provided one of the most photographed moments of the fair’s VIP day. What immediately drew visitors’ attention was a group of 30 wooden dogs and an elderly man holding a leash.
The works are by Korean artist Yun Suknam, who has long been active in feminist cultural movements advocating for gender equality in Korea. Behind the sculptures, a painting of an elderly peasant gazes directly at the viewer from a wheat field, creating a sense of being immersed in a rural countryside scene.
Elsewhere in the gallery’s expansive booth, there’s a strong focus on highlighting nine modern Korean artists alongside an 18th-century moon jar, an iconic ceramic form that represents Korean heritage. Included here are standout works by Kim Whanki and Song Hyun-Sook. both of which had sold by the end of the fair’s VIP day for ₩2000 million ($1.4 million) and €70,000 ($81,581), respectively.
CON__
Booth F4
With works by Taiki Yokote
Tastemaking Japanese gallery CON__ presented one of the fair’s most striking installations. Taiki Yokote’s Floating Rubble (when the cat’s away, the mice will play) (2025) immediately commanded attention with its sheer scale and rustic materials.
The work was reconstructed from debris salvaged from the artist’s former studio. Using magnets and sculptural techniques, Yokote transformed discarded architectural fragments into floating, animated entities. Once functional, the rubble is now treated as “living entities” that emphasize presence in the here and now.
Each piece bears a name, such as “Po” or “Ten,” as if they were members of a family. The work reflects the artist’s affection for his student years and draws attention to overlooked objects and hidden stories.
Make Room and APALAZZO GALLERY
Booth B22
With works by Aleze Zheng, Hammzat Tahabsim, Linn Meyers, Pia Ortuno, Yiyi Bai, Xin Liu, Ibrahim Mahama, Nathalie Du Pasquier, and Luc Ming Yan
Los Angeles gallery Make Room makes its debut at the fair, partnering with the Brescia, Italy–based APALAZZO GALLERY. The booth marks the first collaboration between the two woman-led galleries, united in creating space for disenfranchised communities and voices traditionally overlooked.
The booth’s centerpiece is a monumental fabric installation by Ghanaian artist Ibrahim Mahama. Composed of stitched jute sacks, the work probes themes of migration and global trade. Juxtaposed with it is Xin Liu’s Primula Flowers (2025), sculptures framed in precision aluminum and silicone. Their clinical aesthetic is heightened by a custom cooling system that blurs the line between flesh and machine.
Primula Flowers, 2024
Xin Liu (b. 1991)
Make Room
Scenery in the Inner Vision (Ⅱ), 2025
Bai Yiyi
Make Room
Contempt, 2025
Aleza Zheng
Make Room
Untitled, 2024
Linn Meyers
Make Room
Completing the presentation, Shanghai-based artist YiYi Bai’s paintings provide a resonant backdrop for Liu’s synthetic beings. Merging visual memories with spiritual experience, Bai blends software-generated imagery with brushwork to craft a hybrid world where natural landscapes meet inner consciousness.
Hauser & Wirth
Booth A25
With works by Rita Ackermann, Larry Bell, Mark Bradford, George Condo, Jeffrey Gibson, Rashid Johnson, Christina Kimeze, Lee Bul, Angel Otero, Gary Simmons, and Avery Singer
Swiss mega-gallery Hauser & Wirth staged an ambitious presentation that aligns with solo shows by its major artists across Seoul institutions during the fair.
Highlights included Louise Bourgeois’s intimately scaled bronze sculpture Topiary (2005), merging the female form with natural motifs. The artist currently has a show at The Hoam Museum of Art, and the work was presented alongside a group of late works on paper, such as What You Look Like (2007), which showcase her innovative printmaking practice from her final years.
Also on view were works by Lee Bul, who joined the gallery earlier this year and this week opened a major show at the Leeum, Samsung Museum of Art. Works featured include Untitled (Cyborg—Velvet #23) (2019), a suspended, headless female cyborg draped in velvet that questions ideals of technological perfection. Also on view is the crystalline, fragmented Untitled Sculpture (W6-1) (2010), part of the artist’s acclaimed “Sternbau” series, which references architectural structures to explore utopian modernity and its collapse. Also anchoring the booth is a cerulean triptych by Mark Bradford, who currently has a show at the Amorepacific Museum.
Sales at the gallery’s booth took off at a quick pace on the VIP day. As well as the $4.5 million Bradford sale, the gallery reported the seven-figure sale of a work by George Condo, as well as six-figure transactions for artists including Bourgeois, Avery Singer, and Rashid Johnson.
W-Galería
Booth M2
With works by Jaime Davidovich
As the fair’s only Latin American participant, W-Galería introduced Korean audiences to Jaime Davidovich’s abstract monochromes. Produced in post-dictatorship Argentina as the country sought its place in the international art scene, the works reflect both Abstract Expressionist influences and the local sociopolitical contexts of the time.
Davidovich saw the monochrome not as the “death of painting” but as a generative starting point—expanding painting into other media, public space, and eventually the television screen. Though the artist is relatively unknown in Asia, the gallery’s director Mia noted strong collector interest in the works from the first day.
Arario Gallery
Booth A36
With works by Koo Jiyoon, Gwon Osang, Kim Inbai, Don Sunpil, Beak Jungki, Buen Calubayan, Shih Yung Chun, Um Tai-Jung, OK Seungcheol, Yohan Hàn, Lee Seung Ae, Lee Jinju, and Kohei Nawa
A heavyweight of the Korean art scene, Arario Gallery presented a diverse group of Asian artists ranging in scope from emerging to mid-career.
Korean artist Lee Jinju, fresh from a museum show with Yuz Museum’s Hong Kong pop-up, presented uncanny, water-based paintings that reimagine East Asian traditions. Act 4 (2024) uses a shaped canvas with layered, light-absorbing pigments, creating a depth that redefines the relationship between figure, margin, and space.
Afternoon Toy Kitchen Set 午後的小廚房玩具組, 2025
Shih Yung Chun
Arario Gallery
Act 4, 2024
Lee Jinju
Arario Gallery
Ridge-Oblivion on Things, 1979
Um Tai Jung
Arario Gallery
Myoshi 묘시 卯時, 2025
Yohan Hàn
Arario Gallery
Meanwhile, another highlight came with works by Taiwanese artist Shih Yung Chun, who drew strong attention during the fair’s VIP day with his “Toy Packaging” installations. These include Afternoon Toy Kitchen Set (2025) and the related painting Bloody Kitchen (2025). The works staged domestic dramas with figurines and reconstructed packaging inspired by 1980s magazines and advertisements. Shih’s process borrows cinematic and theatrical methods to transform everyday culture into uncanny, miniature worlds.
Jessica Silverman
Booth B6
With works by Andrea Bowers, Clare Rojas, Davina Semo, and Chelsea Ryoko Wong
San Francisco–based gallery Jessica Silverman returns for its third year at Frieze Seoul with an outstanding group presentation of works by four women artists. The booth explores the psychological and social textures of human existence, elevating everyday moments into the otherworldly.
Playground, 2025
Davina Semo
Jessica Silverman
The Slightest Mirage, 2025
Chelsea Ryoko Wong
Jessica Silverman
Earth In All Her Beauty (Passage from Deena Metzger, “The Medicine For These Times”, Desperate Love Letters to a Wounded Earth, June 25th, 2025), Local Plant Studies, 2025
Andrea Bowers
Jessica Silverman
Save Me, 2004
Clare Rojas
Jessica Silverman
Davina Semo’s bell sculptures stand out not only for their aesthetic presence but also for their interactive and audible qualities, adding a note of whimsy for weary visitors navigating a full day at the fair.
Another standout comes with Andrea Bowers’s works on recycled cardboard that depict delicate plant species native to the regions where she lives and works in Los Angeles. A leading activist artist, Bowers bridges the materiality of street protest with quiet devotion to environmental responsibility.
Sun Gallery
Booth M14
With works by ChungJi Lee
Established in Seoul in 1977, Sun Gallery has long championed contemporary Korean artists, with a focus on originality and artistic depth.
For this edition, the gallery presented works by the late ChungJi Lee, one of Korea’s pioneering women abstract painters. Over decades, she remained committed to a monochromatic practice, with highlights on view from the 1980s and 1990s.
○-2001-55 , 2001
ChungJi Lee
Sun Gallery
○-1993-6 , 1993
ChungJi Lee
Sun Gallery
○-2001-911, 2001
ChungJi Lee
Sun Gallery
MU®UE , 1990
ChungJi Lee
Sun Gallery
Often described as “calligraphic abstraction,” Lee’s paintings embody her belief in the union of matter and spirit, as well as the dialogue between East and West. Using rollers and knives to layer or scrape her canvases, she created dynamic surfaces that sometimes recall the strokes of Chinese characters. The resulting works merge physical action with meditative depth.
According to the gallery’s sales director, Jess Slotterback, the artist has recently been rediscovered and is increasingly sought after by younger collectors.
DE SARTHE
Booth C23
With works by Mitchell F. Chan, Lov-Lov, Mak2, and Zhong Wei
Moonboi, 2025
Mitchell F. Chan
DE SARTHE
Hong Kong gallery DE SARTHE made its Frieze Seoul debut with a splash, premiering a new digital work by Canadian artist Mitchell F. Chan that visitors were lining up to experience.
Moonboi (2025) is a participatory performance piece in the form of an endless car-racing game. Within the controlled environment, players are invited to reflect on the limitations of their agency. Chan likens the experience to socioeconomic structures, suggesting that engaging with the art market can feel like “striking coins in a game” with no certainty of winning.
Home Sweet Home: After Love Pool 3, 2023
Mak2
DE SARTHE
Home Sweet Home: Instagram Photobooth 1, 2024
Mak2
DE SARTHE
Hello World 20250517, 2025
Zhong Wei
DE SARTHE
Whispers of Petals, 2025
Lov-Lov
DE SARTHE
Another highlight was Arsty Vanguard alum Mak2’s iconic triptych Home Sweet Home (2019), which takes inspiration from the video game The Sims. Each digital image is divided into three sections, with each painted by different craftsmen hired through the Chinese e-commerce platform Taobao. The resulting disparities between fantasy and reality underscore the humor and critical lens signature to Mak2’s practice.
Carvalho
Booth A11
With works by Yulia Iosilzon
New York gallery Carvalho makes its Frieze Seoul debut this year, following a special project with the same artist, Yulia Iosilzon, at Frieze’s space at No. 9 Cork Street in London. Still, the gallery has been showing in Seoul for five consecutive years, underscoring its deep investment in the market.
For its booth, the gallery presents a new installation and series of paintings by the British artist that revisit the Greek myth of Narcissus through a contemporary lens. Nine vibrant paintings are hung in a semi-oval formation, each capturing a different moment of the myth and arranged in sequence. At the center is a ceramic pond, evoking the fleeting nature of Narcissus’s reflection.
Iosilzon’s palette is whimsical, almost like an illustrated children’s tale. The installation creates a tension between the painted gaze and the ceramic pond, drawing viewers into the work as part of the narrative, while also breaking away from the weight of masters like Caravaggio, who have depicted similar scenes.
“Iosilzon’s reimagining of Narcissus asks us to consider how we might live within our image-saturated society in a more imaginative way,” writes Dr. Rebecca Birrell, a fellow at the University of St Andrews, in an accompanying essay.
from Artsy News https://ift.tt/ik3Fw21
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