A Slow Afternoon at Leeum: Reading Korea's Modern Art

Leeum sits on a Hannam-dong hillside the way Lee Garden Three sits on its corner of Causeway Bay — quiet, vertical, more discreet than the address suggests. One arrives by taxi from Itaewon Station, climbs a short ramp, and is offered a locker, a printed map, and the kind of low lighting one recognises from the better Asian private museums. The afternoon I have in mind is unhurried — three buildings, two espressos, one shuttle south — and it reads, on first impression, as the most civilised way to spend the hours between a morning consultation and an early dinner in Apgujeong.

Why Leeum, and why this particular afternoon

Leeum is the private museum of the Samsung Foundation of Culture, opened in 2004 in Hannam-dong, north of the Han River and a short shuttle from Gangnam proper. What recommends it, on a recovery afternoon, is not the marquee names — though the marquee names are present — but the rhythm of the place. Three buildings, designed respectively by Mario Botta, Jean Nouvel, and Rem Koolhaas, sit around a small central courtyard. The collection moves from celadon and Joseon white porcelain through ink painting and into contemporary installation — a quiet arc of three centuries — and the architecture is quiet enough to let one read it slowly. I came on a Tuesday, the gallery floors half-empty, and stayed nearly four hours without noticing. The room — and this matters — keeps you. There is no hard sell, no gift-shop crescendo, no cafeteria queue. One simply walks, sits, walks again.

The Botta building: Korean ceramics, read slowly

Museum 1, the terracotta-brick rotunda by Mario Botta, holds the traditional collection — celadon, buncheong, Joseon white porcelain, gold-thread Buddhist painting, and a small but careful selection of ink works. The route reads from the top floor downward; one takes the lift to the fourth floor and walks down through the centuries, which is the inverse of how most museums sequence their visitors. I find this gentler. By the time one reaches the Joseon white porcelain on the lower floor, the eye has already been calibrated by Goryeo celadon — those impossibly cool blue-greens — and the white reads not as plain but as deliberately pared. A friend in Hong Kong who collects buncheong texted me later: 呢啲先係真嘢. She wasn't wrong, exactly. The wall labels are bilingual, the lighting low, and the benches placed where one actually wants to sit — which is more than I can say for most museums in this region.

The Nouvel building: contemporary, with restraint

Museum 2, Jean Nouvel's stainless-steel and glass cube, holds the modern and contemporary collection — Lee Ufan, Park Seo-Bo, Anish Kapoor, Damien Hirst, a small Rothko. The curation is selective rather than encyclopaedic; one is not asked to like everything, only to look. The Lee Ufan room — three large canvases and a stone — is the room I returned to twice. There is a Korean restraint in the hanging that I find harder to locate in, say, the M+ contemporary floors in West Kowloon, where the curatorial voice is louder and the wall text more declarative. Leeum lets the work breathe. The Nouvel building's exterior also matters: those rusting steel panels were intended to weather, and after twenty years they have, into a colour that reads against the brick of the Botta rotunda the way a well-cut tweed reads against linen. One notices these things on a slow afternoon.

M2 and the temporary halls: where the surprises live

The Koolhaas-designed Black Box — officially the Samsung Child Education and Culture Center, but functionally the temporary exhibition wing — is where the programming has been most interesting in the last three years. The shows rotate every four to six months; recent seasons have run from a major Maurizio Cattelan retrospective to a quieter survey of Korean abstract painters who worked through the 1970s and 80s. The space itself is a cantilevered concrete volume, dramatic from below, and the interior reads as a black box theatre — a deliberate contrast to the Botta and Nouvel halls. I do not always love the temporary work, and that is the point; one reads what one finds, and decides. The current schedule is published on the Leeum website roughly six weeks ahead, in Korean and English, and tickets for the temporary shows are timed and bookable in advance — which I would recommend on weekends. On a weekday afternoon, walk-in is fine.

The pause: the cafe, the courtyard, the stairs

Halfway through, one needs a cafe. The on-site cafe sits between the Botta and Nouvel buildings, glass-walled, with a short menu — a flat white, a yuzu sparkling, two or three small pastries. It is not a destination cafe in the Apgujeong sense; it is a museum cafe that does what a museum cafe should do, which is offer a chair, a table, and twenty minutes of silence. I sat there longer than I meant to, watching the afternoon light move across the brick. The courtyard outside, when the weather is mild, holds an Anish Kapoor mirror sculpture and an Olafur Eliasson piece — both worth a slow circuit. The stairs that descend to street level are themselves a small piece of architecture; one comes out facing south, and the city, which had felt distant from inside the museum, returns at the bottom of the steps. From there it is a fifteen-minute walk down through Hannam to the river, or — if one is heading back to Gangnam — a short taxi or the shuttle I take next.

The shuttle south: Hannam back to Gangnam without fuss

The most civilised way back to Gangnam from Leeum, in my experience, is not the subway. The Hannam-dong subway connection requires a transfer and a longer-than-necessary walk, and on a recovery afternoon one does not want either. Instead, a Kakao Taxi from the museum forecourt to Apgujeong Rodeo or Sinsa-dong takes twelve to eighteen minutes depending on Hannam-Bridge traffic, costs roughly KRW 9,000 to 14,000, and drops one within walking distance of the better hotels in southern Gangnam. The bus 405 runs the same corridor and is cheaper, but the route adds twenty minutes. If one is staying in Apgujeong or near Garosu-gil, I would take the taxi without thinking about it. The shuttle path also makes the geography of Seoul legible in a way the subway does not — north of the river, then across, then south — which I find useful for orientation. By the time one is back in Sinsa, it is early evening, the avenue has begun to light up, and dinner is twenty minutes away. The afternoon ends without strain.

Practical notes: hours, tickets, language, lockers

Leeum opens Tuesday through Sunday, ten to six, closed Mondays — and closed on the Korean Lunar New Year and Chuseok holidays, which catch out visitors who haven't checked. General admission to the permanent collection is free; the temporary exhibitions in M2 are ticketed, typically KRW 10,000 to 18,000, bookable on the museum website roughly four weeks in advance. The lockers in the lobby are coin-free and large enough for a small overnight bag. Audio guides are available in Korean, English, Mandarin, and Japanese, and the wall text in the permanent halls is bilingual Korean-English throughout. Photography is permitted in the permanent collection without flash, prohibited in most temporary exhibitions — staff are polite but firm. The neighbourhood around the museum, Hannam-dong, is worth a slow loop afterwards if one has time; the lanes east of the museum hold a handful of independent galleries and one or two of the better small bookshops in Seoul.

Frequently asked questions

How long should one plan for a Leeum visit?

Three to four hours is comfortable for both permanent buildings plus a temporary show. Two hours is enough if one focuses on the Botta or Nouvel building alone. I would not budget less than two; the architecture itself rewards slow walking, and the cafe break in the middle is part of the rhythm.

Is the museum easy to reach from southern Gangnam?

Yes — a taxi from Apgujeong or Sinsa runs twelve to eighteen minutes and costs roughly KRW 9,000 to 14,000 depending on Hannam-Bridge traffic. The subway requires a transfer at Yaksu or Itaewon and is slower. For a recovery afternoon I would take the taxi without thinking about it.

Do I need to book tickets in advance?

The permanent collection is free and walk-in. Temporary exhibitions in M2 are timed-entry and ticketed — bookable on the Leeum website typically four to six weeks in advance, and worth booking ahead on weekends. On weekday afternoons one can usually buy tickets at the desk for a same-day slot.

Is the museum suitable for a quiet post-procedure afternoon?

Unusually well-suited, in my reading. The lighting is low, the seating generous, the buildings climate-controlled, and the pace entirely self-directed. There is no walking required beyond what one chooses; benches in every gallery; and the cafe sits exactly where one would want it to. It reads as a recovery space without being designed as one.

What about language — is English signage adequate?

Bilingual Korean-English throughout the permanent halls, with audio guides also in Mandarin and Japanese. Wall text in temporary exhibitions varies but is usually bilingual. Staff English at the front desk is reliable; in the galleries it is less consistent but adequate for ticketing and basic questions.

Are the on-site cafe and dining worth using, or eat elsewhere?

The on-site cafe is right for a mid-visit pause — a flat white and a small pastry, twenty minutes of quiet. I would not plan a meal there. For dinner, descend the hill into Hannam or take a short taxi south to Apgujeong; the eating is materially better in either direction.

Is photography permitted, and should one bring a proper camera?

Photography is permitted in the permanent collection without flash and without tripods; it is prohibited in most temporary exhibitions. A phone camera is sufficient for documentation; a proper camera draws more attention than it gains. The architecture photographs better in late afternoon light than at midday — a consideration if one is planning the visit around the photographs.