White Plum Dress Illuminates Darkness at Kim Ki-sook Retrospective
Creatrip Team
6 months ago
The Seoul Museum of Craft and Design extended the Kim Ki-sook special exhibition “Dancing, Dreaming, Enlightening” through March 22 after drawing a record 366,046 visitors in six weeks. The retrospective features 56 works spanning the artist’s 40-year career, highlighting her role as a pioneer of Korean fashion art. Signature pieces include the ethereal “baekmae (白梅·white plum blossom) dress,” made with transparent beads that shimmer with light and cast intentional shadows — the shadows themselves are treated as part of the artwork. Kim reinterprets “art garments” in a Korean context using unconventional materials such as wire, beads, traditional cloth, and upcycled waste (spangles, straws, sponge, foil), expanding wearable art into sculptural, suspended installations. The show also presents experimental hanbok (한복) designs that emphasize line and color through bead density. Free to visit without reservation, the exhibition offers late Friday hours and has become a popular photo spot, attracting many young visitors and strong public reviews praising its fusion of tradition and contemporary craft.
