Works by artists represented by Kukje Gallery are featured in RM x SFMOMA: Between You and Me, currently on view at the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art (SFMOMA). Co-curated by RM, the leader of BTS, and SFMOMA curators, the exhibition marks the first time RM’s personal collection has been presented in an institution, shown alongside 36 works from SFMOMA’s collection. The exhibition offers international audiences an opportunity to discover and reflect upon Korean art within the broader context of international art history.
Rather than following conventional art-historical narratives or chronological classifications, the exhibition is organized around the personal memories and impressions that have shaped RM’s collecting journey. Its seven sections—including “Blue Water,” “Friendscape,” “Passion,” and “I don't know why but I like it”—begin with emotions and everyday experiences that resonate across audiences, proposing new connections and dialogues between diverse works. In addition to co-curating the exhibition, RM has written wall texts and descriptions and recorded audio guides, inviting visitors to approach art through their own experiences and senses before relying on prior knowledge.

Kukje Gallery’s artists—Yoo Youngkuk, Han Youngsoo, Kim Yun Shin, Lee Seung Jio, Wook-kyung Choi, Ahn Kyuchul, Suki Seokyeong Kang, Jenny Holzer, Roni Horn, Ugo Rondinone, and Jean-Michel Othoniel—are presented in the exhibition as part of RM’s collection. Presented alongside works by Alexander Calder and Louise Bourgeois from SFMOMA’s collection, these pieces bring together diverse artistic practices across East and West, modern and contemporary art, and the personal and universal.

The opening section, “Blue Water,” explores the varied expressions of the color blue through works by Yoo Youngkuk, including Work (1982), as well as works by Kim Whanki and Yves Klein. Taking blue—a color he has loved since childhood—as the starting point, RM invites visitors to approach abstract art through a familiar sensory experience. The section also features Roni Horn’s glass sculpture Untitled (“But the boomerang that returns is not the same one I threw.”) (2013–2017). RM recalls initially associating the work with water, but after learning that Horn had traveled to Iceland for decades, he began to see the sculpture as resembling a glacier, sharing how personal associations can transform the way we experience a work of art.

The “People” section presents Han Youngsoo’s Deoksugung Palace, Jeong-dong, Seoul (1956–1963, printed in 2022). Reflecting on this photograph documenting everyday life in Seoul after the Korean War, RM recalls displaying the work at his parents’ home, speculating that the photograph reminded them of the time when they were dating.

The “Passion” section highlights artists who, in RM’s words, “pushed themselves forward, regardless of the world’s response.” Featured works include stone sculptures by Kim Yun Shin and a 2015 sculpture made of algarrobo wood; Wook-kyung Choi’s abstract painting The Raven of Death and Resurrection (1975); and Suki Seokyeong Kang's Mat 41 × 30 #19-07 (2019). Together, these works showcase the practices and courses of women artists in modern and contemporary Korean art.

In the section titled “I don't know why but I like it,” Ahn Kyuchul’s Depression (2017) is presented. The section reflects RM’s belief that an appreciation of art does not always need to be explained through art-historical terminology or logical reasoning. Instead, it brings together works that can move viewers without requiring them to articulate precisely why they respond to them.

By sharing personal interpretations and memories associated with artworks, RM x SFMOMA: Between You and Me offers a fresh perspective on modern and contemporary Korean art. Rather than dividing works by period or geography, the exhibition reveals how art intersects with everyday life and evokes the emotions, experiences, and cherished memories that connect us to one another. The exhibition remains on view through February 7, 2027.