Seoul – Pace is pleased to announce details of the Osulloc Tea House at its arts complex in Seoul, opening to the public on September 2, during the inaugural edition of Frieze Seoul. This new tea house, established in collaboration with Osulloc, will offer locally produced teas and Korean-tea infused cocktails conceptualized and executed specially for Pace by Korea’s largest tea brand. Prints, editions, and multiples as well as titles from Pace Publishing, the gallery’s imprint, will also be on view and available for purchase in the tea house. This rotating display will launch with a presentation of works by Kohei Nawa and Lee Kun-Yong.
Visitors to Pace’s Seoul arts complex are invited to immerse in tea culture. Osulloc tea masters and national bartenders will collaborate to present a variety of both alcohol and non-alcoholic cocktails, along with cocktails infused with Osulloc tea. Featuring sleek, contemporary design forged from locally sourced materials, the Osulloc Tea House will have large wooden tables, an expansive bar made of broken concrete, a stone floor, roping on the ceiling, and built-in shelves. A wall of windows and glass doors facing the outdoor sculpture courtyard will cultivate a cohesive indooroutdoor environment. Established in 1979, Osulloc, an affiliate of AmorePacific, operates an 800-acre farm to produce and manufacture its premium organic tea.
Varied works by artists across the gallery’s program will be exhibited in this new, communal space. The first exhibition in the Osulloc Tea House will showcase Nawa’s Particle editions—small-scale mixed media sculptures—and intricate abstractions on paper from his Parameter series. Lambda c-type prints from the artist’s semi-abstract Moment photographs, which feature obscured, almost indiscernible scenes simulating the effect of viewing a fast-moving target from a fixed point, will be featured. Nawa will also create a large-scale, site-specific painting for the wall of the tea house on the occasion of its opening. Together, these works by Nawa, who will present a solo exhibition at Pace’s 540 West 25th Street gallery in New York this fall, reflect his long-standing interest in perception as it relates to scientific and digital phenomena.
A selection of never-before-seen prints by Lee, a pioneer of performance art in Korea who joined the gallery in 2022, will also be presented in the Osulloc Tea House upon its opening. These abstract works are part of Lee’s iconic Bodyscape series, which the artist began in 1976 as part of his experimentations in creating records of his physical relationships to his canvases.
Among the titles from Pace Publishing that will be available upon the opening of the Osulloc Tea House is a Korean translation of The Hooligans, a recent book by Pace Publishing focused on Adrian Ghenie, who will present a solo exhibition of new works on paper in the main gallery space of Pace’s Seoul arts complex from September 2 to October 22. Heralding a new chapter in the imprint’s 60-year history as one of the foremost producers of art books and art historical texts, this new gathering space will see existing and future Pace Publishing titles translated into Korean, bringing original scholarship, boundary-pushing essays, illuminating interviews, and inspired design to new audiences.
The unveiling of the Osulloc Tea House will also coincide with the opening of a new outdoor sculpture courtyard, where the interdisciplinary art collective teamLab will present an interactive digital installation, at Pace’s Seoul arts complex. teamLab’s installation in the courtyard is part of its upcoming solo exhibition with Pace in Seoul, on view from September 2 to October 29 in the gallery’s recently opened ground floor exhibition space that is specially equipped for immersive, experiential artworks. In addition to the outdoor installation, teamLab’s solo show in Seoul will include a selection of monitor-based works and a never-before-seen interactive digital installation titled Massless Suns and Dark Spheres (2022).
For more information about Pace’s upcoming programming at its expanded gallery in Seoul, visit pacegallery.com.
OSULLOC, an affiliate of AmorePacific, is Korea’s largest tea brand. As a producer and manufacturer of tea, it directly operates its eight-hundred-acre tea plantation and offline tea houses with a mission to cultivate tea culture in Korea. The company started in 1979 when AmorePacific’s founder Suh Sungwhan established a green tea farm in Jeju, volcanic island south of the Peninsula. The once barren land now grows premium organic tea, ranging from award-winning tea leaves to uniquely blended flavors. With each cup of tea, OSULLOC is committed to bringing an experience that defines a contemporary tea-centered lifestyle.
Lee Kun-Yong (b. 1942, Sariwon, Korea) is known for his performances that reimagine the ways that the body and its
movements can be understood across time. The artist cultivated his highly experimental practice during the 1970s, when martial law and authoritarianism presented a major affront to civil rights and freedom of expression in South Korea. Lee earned a BFA from Hongik University in Seoul in 1967 and an MA in art education from Keimyung University in Daegu in 1982. He is considered a key figure of the Korean avant-garde, and he was a founding member of the artist group Space and Time. Among the notable group exhibitions he has participated in are the Paris Biennale in 1973; the Bienal de São Paulo in 1979; the Gwangju Biennale in 2000; and the Busan Biennale in 2014. One of the artist’s most famous bodies of work is Bodyscape, in which he approaches his canvases from different angles and uses painting to record the motions of his body. Today, Lee continues to work on series he began in the early years of his career. Much of his ongoing performance work engages with the relationships between his body, his chosen artistic medium, and viewers of his work. The artist lives and works in Seoul.
Kohei Nawa (b. 1975, Osaka, Japan) is a multidisciplinary artist whose diverse practice explores the perception of virtual and physical space and probes the borders between nature and artificiality. He examines relationships between the individual and the whole, illustrating how parts aggregate together, like cells, to create complex and dynamic structures. His work spans painting, drawing, sculpture, and installation, as well as various facets of design and collaborative projects through his Kyoto-based studio, SANDWICH. Nawa’s use of synthetic compounds underscores a recurring theme wherein materials such as polyurethane foam, translucent beads, ink, paint, glue, and silicone oil become devices that prompt an awareness of our mediated environment.
Pace is a leading international art gallery representing some of the most influential contemporary artists and estates from the past century, holding decades-long relationships with Alexander Calder, Jean Dubuffet, Barbara Hepworth, Agnes Martin, Louise Nevelson, and Mark Rothko. Pace enjoys a unique U.S. heritage spanning East and West coasts through its early support of artists central to the Abstract Expressionist and Light and Space movements.
Since its founding by Arne Glimcher in 1960, Pace has developed a distinguished legacy as an artist-first gallery that mounts seminal historical and contemporary exhibitions. Under the current leadership of President and CEO Marc Glimcher, Pace continues to support its artists and share their visionary work with audiences worldwide by remaining at the forefront of innovation. Now in its seventh decade, the gallery advances its mission through a robust global program—comprising exhibitions, artist projects, public installations, institutional collaborations, performances, and interdisciplinary projects. Pace has a legacy in art bookmaking and has published over five hundred titles in close collaboration with artists, with a focus on original scholarship and on introducing new voices to the art historical canon.
The gallery has also spearheaded explorations into the intersection of art and technology through its new business models, exhibition interpretation tools, and representation of artists cultivating advanced studio practices. As part of its commitment to technologically engaged artists within and beyond its program, Pace launched a hub for its web3 activity, Pace Verso, in November 2021.
Today, Pace has nine locations worldwide, including a European foothold in London and Geneva, and two galleries in New York—its headquarters at 540 West 25th Street, which welcomed almost 120,000 visitors and programmed 20 shows in its first six months, and an adjacent 8,000 sq. ft. exhibition space at 510 West 25th Street. Pace’s long and pioneering history in California includes a gallery in Palo Alto, which operated from 2016 to 2022. Pace’s engagement with Silicon Valley’s technology industry has had a lasting impact on the gallery at a global level, accelerating its initiatives connecting art and technology as well as its work with experiential artists. Pace consolidated its West Coast activity through its flagship in Los Angeles, which opened in 2022. Pace was one of the first international galleries to establish outposts in Asia, where it operates permanent gallery spaces in Hong Kong and Seoul, as well as an office and viewing room in Beijing. Pace’s satellite exhibition spaces in East Hampton and Palm Beach present continued programming on a seasonal basis.
