Talks

Fashionably Korea: A Look at the Past, Present, and Future of Traditional Korean Dress

Dr. Vicki Sung-yeon Kwon is an art historian and curator specializing in Korean art and visual culture. As the inaugural Associate Curator of Korean Art and Culture at ROM, she oversees Canada’s largest collection of Korean cultural heritage. Her PhD dissertation at the University of Alberta examined socially engaged art by Korean and Japanese artists, supported by a SSHRC doctoral fellowship. As a fellow at Seoul National University’s Kyujanggak Institute, she advanced research for a monograph on feminist art activism in Korea. An award-winning educator, she has taught Korean and East Asian art history as well as Art as Social Practice at the University of Alberta and currently teaches at the University of Toronto. Her curated exhibitions and past publications explored the cultural exchange between North Korea and Guyana, artist practice addressing wartime sexual violence during the Asia-Pacific War and the Vietnam War, and Korean Canadian diasporic art. 

Kyunghee Pyun is a professor of art history and museum professions at the Fashion Institute of Technology (FIT), State University of New York. Her work focuses on Asian art, Asian American visual culture, and the global exchange of art and design between Asia, Europe, and North America. She has published widely on the reception of Asian art in the West, the history of collecting, and global histories of luxury and decorative arts. 

Dr. Pyun is the co-editor of Fashion, Identity, Power in Modern Asia (Palgrave Macmillan, 2018) and the author of the forthcoming book School Uniforms in East Asia: Fashioning State and Selfhood. Her scholarship connects art history, fashion studies, and museum practice, making complex cultural histories accessible to broad audiences.

Minjee Kim is a scholar of dress, fashion, and textiles based in the San Francisco Bay Area and New York City. Born and raised in South Korea, she earned her Ph.D. from Seoul National University with a dissertation on the dress culture of the Balhae dynasty (698–926). She has taught since 1993 across a wide range of educational settings—from community colleges to undergraduate and graduate programs, as well as public and museum-based education—in both South Korea and the United States. She is currently an adjunct professor at the Fashion Institute of Technology, where she teaches History of East Asian Dress beginning in Spring 2026. 

Hea Jin Kwon is a leading scholar and practitioner of Korean traditional costume, specializing in royal court dress and embroidery, particularly Hwalot. She is the CEO of Hanbok Studio HYEON and serves as an adjunct professor and instructor at Ewha Womans University and ESMOD Seoul. She holds a Ph.D. in Literature from Ewha Womans University and has published extensively on Korean costume history in major academic journals and museums, including the National Palace Museum of Korea, the Victoria and Albert Museum, and the Field Museum in Chicago. Her work bridges academic research, contemporary Hanbok design, and public engagement, contributing significantly to the global understanding and revitalization of Korean traditional dress. She is the recipient of the 2024 Hanbok Person of the Year Award from the Korean Ministry of Culture, Sports and Tourism. 

KeySook Geum (琴基淑) is a Korean artist, designer, and educator. With a PhD in Textiles from Ewha Womans University in Seoul and post-graduate studies in the United States, she has worked as a costume designer for large-scale dance and theatre productions. Geum was a professor in the Department of Textile Art and Fashion Design at Hongik University in Seoul (now retired). 

Geum creates delicate, dress-like sculptures from twisted wire, crystals, and beads. Resembling lace and flowing fabric, her works often take the form of gowns, robes, and waistcoats that appear to float weightlessly in space. Blending Asian and Western influences with a contemporary sensibility, her sculptures evoke elegance, movement, and quiet romance. Though shaped like garments, they are intentionally empty, suggesting presence through absence. Light passes through their mesh surfaces, casting intricate shadows, while crystals shimmer like drops of morning dew, conveying a sense of beauty, optimism, and wonder.