The scene of the Gwanghwamun area is in a state of change.

As we enter the cultural age of the 21st century, the Gwanghwamun area has received much attention as a burgeoning street of new values and a place to share dreams about the future. The Chonggye stream has started to flow again between the high-tech business buildings of the metropolitan, allowing people to congregate and find cultural activities away from their bustling lives of cemented society.

The Ilmin Museum of Art building is a historically symbolic building, which was originally built in 1926 as the corporate headquarters for Dong-a Ilbo.  The building was used for printing newspapers until 1992 when Dong-A Ilbo moved its headquarters to a building in Chungjeongno.  Using this opportunity, the Ilmin Cultural Foundation opened the Ilmin Cultural Center at the then-vacated building in 1994.  Once all the necessary approvals and paperwork were successfully completed, the Ilmin Cultural Foundation opened the museum in December of 1996.  Since its initial construction, the building has undergone various extensions and renovations, which eventually resulted in the museum being re-opened in February of 2002.  Although the renovations made for the re-opening added some modern flavor to its interior design, the museum remained true to its original architects and maintained its original form.  As a result, the Museum has been designated as tangible cultural properties number 131.

The Ilmin Museum of Art holds visual cultural exhibitions that play a critical role in expressing issues of current affairs, popularity, and identity in an attempt to create a mutual understanding of aesthetic value in this era and in our daily lives.  In addition to its cultural exhibitions, the museum has been dedicated to creating an image archive by running the ‘documentary archive’.  These archives are unique in Korea as it provides visitors a chance to view documentary videos as well as assisting in the annual publication of the ‘Ilmin Visual Culture’. The Ilmin Museum of Art will continue to work as a communicator to the general public, while advancing the cultural development of Korean society as it aims to achieve a more developed, more enriched social culture.
We invite you to the Ilmin Museum of Art, where the past, present and the future coexist.  Being a special place where you can encounter beautiful traditions and visions of the future, we sincerely hope you can discover the influence and meaning of visual culture in our lives.