Perhaps there was a feeling of awkwardness about hallyu driving these questions. It is true that so-called “national prestige enhancing” news, such as the occasional news of Korean films, directors, and actors winning awards abroad, international enthusiasm for locally produced Netflix original dramas, and the explosive popularity of K-pop artists, felt both close and distant to me at the same time. After the Frieze Art Fair was successfully launched in Seoul in September 2022, a number of famous overseas galleries opened branches in Korea’s capital city. As such, it was clear that Korea had gained more recognition in the global art world, yet hallyu remained a concept that Koreans could not fully wrap their heads around. That is why I was so curious about how non-Koreans would interpret hallyu through an exhibition held outside of Korea.

Hallyu, as dealt with through the V&A’s Hallyu! The Korean Wave, had a very clear purpose in this case. When talking about this, Rosalie Kim, curator of the exhibition and the V&A’s Korean Pavilion, said, “South Korea has captivated the world over with hallyu, its vibrant and creative popular culture, which has transformed the country’s image from one devastated by the Korean War to that of a leading cultural powerhouse in the era of social media and digital culture today.” The introductory part, titled “What is Hallyu?” marks the beginning of the exhibition with singer PSY’s Gangnam Style, a song that caused an international sensation in 2012. It is crazy to think that Gangnam Style, which had been in the hallyu spotlight every day for so long, it seemed, is a story from a decade ago.

The exhibition instantly imparts upon viewers a feeling of intimacy with popular content that almost anyone may have already encountered at least once, and then examines Korea’s historical background and its dynamic modern history, which starts in the Japanese colonial era and then moves through to the Korean War, dictatorship, rapid industrial development as a developing country, and the process of achieving democracy. The first section is “From Rubble to Smartphones.” The time frames and contexts of historical materials, such as black-and-white photographs in the 1970s, posters of Hodori at the 1988 Seoul Olympics, and photos of a Samsung Electronics factory, can of course be immediately interpreted from a Korean’s perspective. However, it was not clear if foreign audiences would be able to recognize those same historical materials with the appropriate magnitude they represented. This is because the literacy gap about the history and culture of a foreign country is a natural challenge for people. Nevertheless, the exhibition attracts viewers with its color variations derived from the color combination of dancheong (Korean traditional decorative coloring on wooden buildings), the systematic arrangement of Korean contemporary artists such as Nam June Paik, Ham Kyungah, and Gwon Osang, and the attractive flow of the exhibition through its deliberate contrast in spaces.

Designer Na Kim, who took charge of the creative lead in this exhibition, identified hallyu as a “living creature,” explaining, “For me, hallyu is a contemporary trend that cannot be said to belong to a single field or country. As the preparation for the exhibition went on over a long period of time, there were situations where the content had to change while we were in the midst of it all. This made me realize—yet again—that hallyu is indeed content that is constantly changing. Also, many areas that are at the forefront of cultural trends these days are related to hallyu.” In certain ways, this exhibition kicked off quite some time ago. Three years ago, when preparations for the exhibition began, the film Parasite had not won the Academy Award for Best Picture, while the international success of the Netflix series Squid Game was unthinkable. Due to hallyu’s dynamic nature, the exhibition elements of the second section, “Spotlighting K-drama and Cinema,” continued to change during the preparation period. 

It is actually very interesting that this ever-changing content was displayed in the form of a cabinet. The reason for this has to do with the cabinet and its historical context of capturing individual tastes. At the same time, it is also a methodology that deviates the past artifacts or time & space from the original context to connect them all under one present theme. This gives the impression that hallyu is officially seen as a global trend that has now cemented its place in human history. In fact, designer Na Kim expanded her idea by focusing on “hybridity.” For example, there is a distinct hybridity created when an advertisement poster from first-generation Korean advertising photographer Kim Han-Yong (1924-2016) is juxtaposed with a Billboard magazine cover image featuring Lisa, a member of the K-pop group BLACKPINK. As Na Kim put it, “I thought the cabinet could be a very effective way to combine the mixed content from different time periods into one exhibition. While it can be archived and interpreted as content with an absolute nature to it, I think the cabinet was a device that could embrace the flexibility of the individual’s subjectivity to accept such content.” In short, it was an approach to how contemporaries use the language of hallyu regardless of their nationality.

The exhibition continues with “Sounding K-pop and Fandoms” and ends with “Making K-beauty and Fashion.’’ These are indispensable aspects of hallyu. One of the unconventional collections of the exhibition has to do with cheering banners produced by K-pop fans. Given that the major role of a museum is to collect, preserve, and study art and historical materials, one could say that hallyu is now seen as something to be collected, preserved, and studied as a kind of global cultural phenomenon. The contemporary position on “what and how to historize” is in line with such an unpredictable transformation of culture. This exhibition is full of relatively positive, uplifting, and energetic nuances. Rather than taking an overly serious approach from an academic and critical point of view, it seems to be a summary of the aftermath of trends driven by the pop culture industry. What mindset should we, the party concerned in this case, have regarding the cultural depth and continuity of hallyu? Designer Na Kim offered an interesting opinion: “I think it’s worth paying attention to creators in their 20s who are active right now. I can feel the strong energy unique to people who don’t feel a certain sense of belonging anywhere and don’t have a safe place to lean on. Don’t you think it’s possible to predict the next trend in hallyu from the originality they create?”

Cultural content researchers also classify the changes in hallyu as “East Asian Hallyu,” “Hallyu 2.0,” and “Hallyu 3.0.” After the IMF foreign exchange crisis in the late 1990s, Korean dramas such as Dae Jang Geum (Jewel in the palace) marked the first step in attracting attention to Korean pop culture in Asia. Online games and idol culture, which took off in the mid-2000s, were then the mainstream of Hallyu 2.0. In the presently ongoing Hallyu 3.0, there is a borderless fandom concerning K-content that, in addition to K-pop, penetrates Hangeul, clothing, food, and the beauty industry. Hallyu is now not only being classified in a vertical way, but is also being conceptualized and categorized in a horizontal approach. As a result, it is likely that other changes will lead to reimagining what hallyu means after the exhibition, which runs until June 2023.