In first, Korean museum looks at Oceanian cultures
Exhibit offers inspiration to help combat climate change, the National Museum of Korea says
The National Museum of Korea has opened an exhibition on Oceanian cultures, the first attempt by a Korean institution to focus on regions in the South Pacific spanning the East and Western hemispheres.
'Mana Moana: Arts of the Great Ocean, Oceania' looks through some 180 items from the 18th century like canoes, the high-priority survival object essential to the Maori people, New Zealand's Indigenous population.
Gloves adorned with shark teeth, hooks in the shape of human faces and headgear made of spines from porcupine fish shed light on everyday life back then. Pearl shells and necklaces made of hairs or jade — the symbol of honor and authority — show how Oceanians viewed beauty and attached deeper meaning to it.
The exhibition, which opened Wednesday, is thematically arranged in three sections: seas, islands and lands. 'The arrangement reflects the way of life Oceanians must have embraced. Each space is unique. So are artifacts associated with it,' the museum said.
The exhibit further aims to rethink what it means to 'connect and coexist' with the future, said Kim Jae-hong, the NMK director general.
'The way the islands groups within the vast expanse of the South Pacific Ocean remain connected and how they prepare to ride out future challenges facing them are the conversation we want to put out,' Kim said, citing finding inspiration for answers to climate change as doable via the presentation.
'Pacific island nations offer inspiration to some of the crises landlocked countries grapple with,' Kim added.
Kim, who took over the current role in July last year, has since doubled down on ramping up the museum's global outreach.
The latest exhibition, jointly organized with the Quai Branly Museum in Paris, is an effort to that end, according to Kim.
'Showcasing each people's original culture and everything in coexistence with it is what we want to express at this exhibition,' said Emmanuel Kasarherou, president of the the Quai Branly Museum, who is of Melanesian descent.
After closing on Sept. 14, the exhibition will travel to the Jeonnam Museum of Art in Gwangyang, South Jeolla Province, from Sept. 30 to Dec. 28.
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