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Sooyoung Leam is an art historian and curator based in Seoul. She has been actively engaged in research and curatorial projects focusing on modern and contemporary art in East Asia, with a particular interest in transnational exhibition practices and the formation of Asian subjectivities. She currently teaches at Seoul National University and Kyung Hee University. Her research has appeared in journals such as Sculpture Journal and Journal of History of Modern Art.
Forthcoming publications include “The Citizens Art School: Practicing Collectivity through Printmaking in South Korea, 1980s–90s” in Toward a New Aesthetics: Institutional Criticism in Art Education from 1900 to Today (Brill, 2025), and “East Asia through the Lens of Suwon: Communication Art Group (1990–96) and the Festivalization of Performance” in Art in Translation. Her recent curatorial projects include the Seoul Art Prize-shortlisted exhibition Walking Korea: Cut Pieces (Seoul, 2024–25), the 14th Gwangju Biennale (Gwangju, 2023), and To A Faraway Friend: Beyond Afro – Southeast Asian Affinities (Busan, 2022).
She earned her BA in History of Art from the University of Cambridge, followed by an MA and PhD from the Courtauld Institute of Art in London. Her doctoral research focused on the sculptural experiments of Lee Seung-taek, exploring the intersections of avant-garde art and postwar Korean history.
