Hyundai Motor Presents MMCA Hyundai Motor Series 2023: Jung Yeondoo – One Hundred Years of Travels

SEOUL, September 5, 2023 – Hyundai Motor Company today announced the opening of MMCA Hyundai Motor Series 2023: Jung Yeondoo – One Hundred Years of Travels, the 10th annual exhibition in partnership with the National Museum of Modern and Contemporary Art, Korea (MMCA).

The exhibition, which runs from September 6, 2023, until February 25, 2024, at MMCA’s Seoul Box and Gallery 5, presents five works across various mediums, including video installations, photographs and performances. One Hundred Years of Travels, Imaginary Song, Generational Portraits and Wall of Blades are newly commissioned works.

For MMCA Hyundai Motor Series 2023, the artist Jung Yeondoo examines the narratives of the Korean diaspora in Mexico, inspired by the mythical journey of a prickly pear cactus from Mexico to Jeju Island. The artist imagines a ‘century-long journey of plants and people’ between Korea and Mexico to cultivate a sense of empathy for the unfamiliar.

 “MMCA Hyundai Motor Series 2023: Jung Yeondoo – One Hundred Years of Travels offers an opportunity to enhance a better understanding of diasporas and migrations, which have become universal challenges in the modern and contemporary era for a variety of causes, including political and economic factors as well as climate change,” said DooEun Choi, Art Director at Hyundai Motor Company. “I believe this exhibition will foster in-depth reflection on the future by revisiting the past.”

This exhibition signifies an extension of the artist’s enduring approach, wherein he strives to access reality and history while employing strangeness to examine in detail the multi-layered aspects within a reality once disregarded as familiar. Its objective is to spotlight immigrants’ life journeys and perspectives within a realm of hybridity and diverse cultures, utilizing art to bridge understanding between viewers and unfamiliar subjects.

Created as one of the long-term partnership programs with MMCA, MMCA Hyundai Motor Series has organized annual exhibitions of esteemed Korean artists since 2014, including the duo of Moon Kyungwon and Jeon Joonho in 2021 and Choe U-Ram in 2022. Through this series, Hyundai Motor aims to contribute to the development of Korea’s arts and culture by supporting established Korean artists’ large-scale solo exhibitions every year and convey Hyundai Motor’s brand vision ‘Progress for Humanity’ through long-term partnerships with global museums.