The heat outside is at its peak, but the art world is already turning toward autumn. If, in the first half of the year, a solo exhibition by Damien Hirst and a retrospective of Yoo Youngkuk drove the art scene's attendance, then in the second half, around September when the largest art fairs Frieze Seoul and Kiaf Seoul open, major exhibitions by domestic and international artists who have expanded the boundaries of contemporary art will follow.

At the National Museum of Modern and Contemporary Art, Seoul, translucent houses made of vividly colored fabric will be installed. At the solo exhibition of the world-renowned installation artist Do Ho Suh, ‘Do Ho Suh,’ opening on August 27, the show broadly surveys more than 30 years of his practice, from early works and major pieces to projects currently underway. He has explored issues of space, memory, and identity around themes of migration and dwelling, the individual and the community. He is widely known for life-size reconstructions of homes and passageways he has lived in, rendered in translucent fabric. At the Gwacheon branch, starting in November, ‘Georgia O'Keeffe and American Modern Art,’ centered on Georgia O'Keeffe (1887~1986), famed for canvases that magnify flowers to fill the frame, will open.

Leeum Museum of Art will present Koo Jeong A's solo exhibition ‘Koo Jeong A: Usmos’ starting September 5; Koo, selected as the artist for the Korean Pavilion at the 2024 Venice Biennale, has probed flows of energy that are invisible yet presentlike magnetism or scentdisturbing sense and perception. In this exhibition as well, works permeate the museum, extending beyond the galleries into the lobby, behind walls, and among antiquities.

At the Sehwa Museum of Art, the first exhibition in Korea since the death of German Neo-Expressionist master Georg Baselitz (1938~2026), who passed away this April, opens on August 13. Inverted figures, fragmented bodies, and twisted, scattered forms emerge through rough brushwork. The show moves from early works of the 1960s~80s to portraits of his lifelong partner Elke, the ‘Remix’ series in which he reinterpreted his past motifs after the 2000s, and the ‘Gold Paintings’ to which he devoted himself late in life. Forty-six workspaintings, sculptures, and drawingsshed light on an artistic world spanning more than six decades.

The Amorepacific Museum of Art will hold the first large-scale solo exhibition in Korea of conceptual art pioneer Sol LeWitt (1928~2007), ‘Sol LeWitt: Open Structure,’ from September 1. It will present his wall drawings, geometric three-dimensional sculptures, paintings, and drawings, by an artist who valued the ideas and rules underlying the work over its physical form.

The Seoul Museum of Art in October will present ‘Lynn Hershman Leeson: My [Selves],’ a look back at more than 60 years of work by the veteran American female media artist and filmmaker Lynn Hershman Leeson; the Busan Museum of Art, reopening in September, will present its first international exhibition ‘Future Museology,’ among others.

The fervor of the art market reaches its peak in early September. The highlights are the international art fairsFrieze Seoul and Kiaf Seoulthat open side by side at COEX in Seoul on September 2. Now in its fifth edition, Frieze will see more than 125 galleries from 30 countries exhibit and sell artworks. World-leading galleries such as Esther Schipper, Gladstone, Lehmann Maupin, Thaddaeus Ropac, and White Cube will join, as will leading Korean galleries including Kukje Gallery and Gallery Hyundai, presenting major works by their artists. Kiaf, the largest art fair in Korea organized by the Korea Galleries Association, will be held alongside it. A total of 175 galleries from 18 countries will showcase works across diverse genres.

As many overseas collectors and art professionals flock to Seoul, museums and galleries also unveil their most carefully prepared exhibitions of the year around this time. Moving between the fairs and the museums and galleries, visitors can encounter a wide range of currents in contemporary art.

The excitement of the art fairs continues into biennales nationwide. The 16th Gwangju Biennale opens on September 5 under the theme ‘You Must Change Your Life.’ Artistic director Ho TzuNyen, together with curators Park Ga-hee, Brian Kuan Wood, and Choi Kyung-hwa, has invited 43 artists (teams) from 22 countries. Artists representing voices across generations and regions explore, from diverse perspectives, the conflicts and difficulties experienced by individuals and communities.

The 2026 Busan Biennale, in which 46 artists and teams (49 individuals) from 22 countries participate, kicks off on August 29. Exhibition directors Evelyn Simons and Amal Khalaf focus on difference, tension, and the possibility of resonance, exploring ways of coexisting. The Jeju Biennale opens on August 25, the Gyeonggi International Ceramic Biennale on September 18, and the Changwon Sculpture Biennale on September 30.