Walking through Icheon and Beyond: The Space Within Form at the Korean Cultural Centre UK, I kept returning to colour before anything else. There was a restrained palette running through the exhibition that felt almost like a visual grammar: earth browns, celadon blues and greens, luminous whites and flashes of copper-red, the colour of fire itself. The tones seemed to carry their own hierarchy. White porcelain felt elevated and ceremonial, while buncheong and darker clay bodies carried something more grounded and immediate.
Yet the longer I spent with the exhibition, the more those assumptions started to dissolve.
What initially appeared to be a story about ceramic traditions gradually became something more expansive: a story about place, collective knowledge and communities of making. I found myself thinking less about individual objects and more about relationships — between master artisans and younger practitioners, between materials and landscapes, and between history and experimentation.
Icheon itself seemed almost like another participant in the exhibition. Deeply scarred by the Korean War before rebuilding itself from the 1960s onwards around the same landscape and resources — clay deposits, wood for kilns and generations of accumulated knowledge — the city eventually became recognised as a UNESCO Creative City of Crafts and Folk Art. Rather than preserving a fixed idea of tradition, the exhibition suggested something more active: tradition as a living practice that continues to evolve.
To understand this further, I spoke with co-curator Jaemin Cha.
Beyond introducing Korean culture
Before discussing the exhibition itself, I was curious about the wider role of the Korean Cultural Centre UK and what its programme is trying to achieve. Icheon and Beyond felt very carefully positioned; less like an isolated exhibition and more like one part of a larger conversation.
For Jaemin Cha, the programme is about moving beyond simple ideas of cultural introduction.
“The KCCUK art programme aims to present the depth and range of Korean artistic practice to UK audiences, not simply as an introduction to Korean culture, but as a contribution to broader international cultural conversations.”
“We work to build sustained relationships with British institutions and audiences, so that Korean art is encountered on its own terms, with the context it deserves.”
That idea felt visible throughout Icheon and Beyond. Rather than presenting Korean ceramics as a static cultural object, the exhibition framed ceramics as a living practice connected to ideas of ecology, place, materiality and collective exchange.
The exhibitions themselves are also intentionally accessible.
“All our exhibitions are free and open Monday to Friday, 10am to 5:30pm,” she explains.
“Alongside exhibitions, we run public lectures, artist talks, curator-led tours, workshops, film screenings and performances. Some events are free, others are ticketed.”
As our conversation continued, it became clear that the exhibition programme operates almost as an evolving platform rather than a sequence of separate shows.
For anyone wanting to follow future events, Cha points towards the Centre’s broader activity:
“The easiest way is through our website at kccuk.org.uk, where you can sign up to our mailing list for news and event announcements. We’re also active on social media, and with a busy summer programme ahead, it’s a good time to sign up.”
The space between tradition and contemporary practice
One of the strongest aspects of Icheon and Beyond is that it avoids presenting traditional and contemporary ceramics as opposing categories.
I asked Cha how the artists had been selected and what she hoped audiences might take away from the exhibition.
“The master artisans were introduced through Icheon City, and what was particularly striking was how they approached the selection themselves. Many considered which pieces would resonate most with a British audience rather than simply presenting what was immediately available.”
The contemporary artists followed a different logic.
“Rather than artists who simply referenced traditional forms on a surface level, the focus was on those who had genuinely absorbed the knowledge, discipline and ways of thinking that the masters embody, and then found their own language for it.”
The aim, she says, was not to create clear distinctions.
“I hoped visitors would leave not with a clear distinction between tradition and contemporary practice, but with a sense of how fluidly the two can speak to each other.”
That fluidity was perhaps what I found most compelling in the exhibition. Rather than separating old and new, there was a constant sense of exchange.
Community as the foundation
One of the strongest feelings I left with was that the exhibition was really about community.
“That relationship was really the foundation of the exhibition,” Cha says.
“People tend to think of traditional and contemporary practice as separate trajectories, but I don’t think that’s how it actually works, especially in a place like Icheon where hundreds of studios and kilns operate in close proximity.”
She describes knowledge moving almost invisibly:
“Knowledge moves between people, between generations, in ways that are often informal and hard to document but absolutely present in the work.”
What she wanted to avoid was a simplistic narrative.
“What I wanted to avoid was staging that relationship as a contrast, the old and the new side by side.”
Instead:
“The more interesting question was where those practices actually touch and influence each other.”
The contemporary artists in the exhibition, she explains, had all spent time learning from master practitioners, not through imitation but through acquiring an understanding of material itself.
“That shows, not as imitation, but as a kind of fluency with the medium that you can’t arrive at any other way.”
Uncertainty, material and surprise
As we walked through the exhibition, Jaemin Cha repeatedly returned to particular works that seemed to crystallise larger ideas running through the show — uncertainty, material intelligence, place and the relationship between control and chance.
“Several works in the exhibition spoke to the idea that ceramics is a dialogue between the maker’s skill and forces beyond their control.”
She highlights Gwangsu Seo’s copper-red flambe jar:
“That depth of red isn’t something you can simply decide on. It emerges through the conditions inside a wood-fired kiln: the intensity of the flame, airflow, oxygen levels.”
“Every firing produces something different. There’s an acceptance of unpredictability built into the practice, which felt central to what the exhibition was exploring.”
Mimi Joung’s work approaches that same openness differently.
“Mimi Joung’s work carries a similar sensibility but operates in a more conceptual register. The way the surface appears to flow and settle naturally brings its own kind of openness to the object.”
Cha also points to Yusun Won’s work:
“Yusun Won’s slightly tilted vessels are deceptively simple. That tilt is entirely intentional, and it shifts how you relate to the object. There’s a quiet instability that makes you look again.”
“She also works with volcanic soil from Jeju mixed with white porcelain, so the material itself carries a sense of place that adds another layer.”
Earlier, I had assumed there was a hierarchy embedded in the exhibition itself — porcelain occupying a more prestigious position than buncheong. Cha suggests contemporary practice complicates this reading.
“Porcelain was associated with the Joseon royal court and literati culture, while buncheong occupied a more everyday register.”
“But I think what contemporary artists are doing is less about overturning that hierarchy and more about working across it freely, without feeling bound by it.”
“What struck me in putting this exhibition together was that the material choice now tends to follow the idea rather than the other way around.”
“An artist like Yusun Won bringing in Jeju volcanic soil isn’t making a statement about prestige, she’s asking a question about place and belonging.”
Icheon as ecosystem
I had mentioned earlier that Icheon itself felt like another participant in the exhibition, and Cha agreed.
“Icheon isn’t simply where these ceramics are made. It’s a place where knowledge accumulates over generations, and that continuity is visible in the work.”
“After the Korean War, the city rebuilt itself around the same landscape, the same clay deposits, the same natural conditions for kiln firing.”
“What developed over time wasn’t just a centre of production but an ecosystem, where techniques, judgements and ways of seeing pass between studios and between generations in ways that are often unspoken but deeply present.”
She sees this as central to understanding why UNESCO recognised the city.
“It’s not about preserving a historical tradition in amber. It’s about a living culture that continues to change precisely because it has that depth of accumulated practice to draw from.”
Rethinking ceramics
I asked whether there had been a moment while developing the exhibition that changed her own understanding of ceramics.
“Visiting Mimi Joung’s studio was one of those moments.”
“Spending time with her and her work made me reconsider what ceramics can be.”
“She isn’t simply a ceramic artist in the traditional sense. She uses ceramics as a material and a tool to ask much larger questions.”
“Seeing that up close made me think about how inadequate the category of craft can be, and how much of the most interesting work happening in ceramics right now refuses to sit comfortably within it.”
There was another moment too:
“The other moment was seeing Hwajeong Yeo’s new work for the first time.”
“I had built up a picture in my mind of what the work might be, and when I finally saw it in person it was close to that image but also genuinely surprising in ways I hadn’t anticipated.”
“That gap between what you imagine and what actually arrives is something I won’t forget easily.”
Becoming part of a wider conversation
Towards the end of our conversation I asked Cha whether KCCUK had further appearances and collaborations planned for 2026. Her response brought me back to something I had felt throughout the exhibition itself: the sense that these projects do not operate in isolation.
“We engage with the UK art calendar in different ways. Sometimes directly as participants, sometimes by aligning our programming with what’s happening across the city.”
“That’s actually something I think about quite carefully when planning the exhibition year. London has a very distinct rhythm.”
She describes the city almost seasonally:
“Spring tends to be the season for craft and design, with Collect and London Craft Week bringing those audiences together, so it made sense to open our ceramics exhibition at that time of year.”
“In autumn, the focus shifts with Frieze London drawing contemporary art audiences, so our programming moves accordingly.”
“Rather than working in isolation, we try to be part of that wider conversation the city is already having.”
Perhaps that idea of conversation is ultimately what Icheon and Beyond keeps returning to. The exhibition begins with ceramics but gradually unfolds into something larger: a conversation between generations, between materials and landscapes, between Korean traditions and international audiences. Most importantly, it suggests that tradition survives not by remaining fixed, but by continuing to move.
Icheon and Beyond: The Space Within Form – 5th June 2026, Korean Cultural Centre UK
Free entry to exhibition, Monday – Friday, 10AM – 5.30PM
About
The Korean Cultural Centre UK, opened under the aegis of the Embassy of the Republic of Korea in the United Kingdom, aims to enhance friendship, amity, and understanding between Korea and the UK through cultural and educational activities. From the KCCUK’s central London location near Trafalgar Square, our dedicated team works to expand cultural projects, strengthen cooperation with major arts organisations and partners, and encourage cultural exchange. @kccuk
Icheon is the historical heart of Korean ceramics, where the ancient legacies of Goryeo Celadon and Joseon White Porcelain continue as a living practice. Today, the city thrives as a vibrant creative community of over 400 active kilns and studios. From the refined precision of designated Masters to the experimental spirit of a new generation, Icheon remains a vital landscape where traditional craftsmanship is continuously redefined through the lens of contemporary art.
