Artist Koh Sang-woo's ‘Still Breathing’ depicts wounded, abused animals to ‘connect divided world’

Animals are often put down for euthanasia when they become ill, but artist Koh Sang-woo, who paints wounded animals as a subject and has worked with endangered species, questioned that notion.

Artist Koh Sang-woo speaks during a press tour of his solo exhibition ″Still Breathing″ at Savina Museum of Contemporary Art in Eunpyeong District, northern Seoul, on April 30. [LIM JEONG-WON]

Animals are often put down for euthanasia when they become ill, but artist Koh Sang-woo, who paints wounded animals as a subject and has worked with endangered species, questioned that notion. If a life is “still breathing,” he thought to himself, couldn't it be preserved further?

This question addresses the key theme in “Still Breathing,” Koh's solo exhibition that opened Saturday at the Savina Museum of Contemporary Art in Eunpyeong District, northern Seoul. The show takes its cue from the theme of this year’s International Museum Day, hosted by the International Council of Museums (ICOM), of “museums uniting a divided world.”

“Still Breathing” is Koh's second exhibition at Savina after a 2022 show on endangered species, and it marks a deliberate narrowing of focus. Where the earlier project pleaded at the level of the species, the new works shown this time around stay close to individual animals — abused, injured, abandoned — and to the people keeping them alive.

The largest works are portraits of spotted seals that Koh photographed off Baengnyeong Island, as part of a project with the World Wide Fund for Nature Korea that took him by boat to within 10 kilometers (6.2 miles) of the North Korean coast.

Most visitors to the island never see the seals; the colony lives further out, between three jurisdictions. Koh spent two years observing them before one four-week-old pup seal held his gaze for about 10 seconds — the pup that now anchors the “Still Breathing” exhibit in a series of digital paintings.

A view of the exhibition space for Korean artist Koh Sang-woo's solo show ″Still Breathing″ at Savina Museum of Contemporary Art in Eunpyeong District, northern Seoul, on April 30 [LIM JEONG-WON]

“The sea and the sky have no borders,” Koh said at a press tour on Thursday. “Animals can pass through freely, which is exactly why they can be a medium that connects a divided world.”

A second body of work comes out of a partnership with Cheongju Zoo, Korea's first designated hub zoo for animals that have been abused or considered beyond rehabilitation at other facilities. Koh had long been opposed to zoos in principle, but changed his position after spending time at the Cheongju Zoo, according to the artist. The animals there cannot be returned to the wild.

“If we sent these animals back, they wouldn't survive a day,” he said.

Artist Koh Sang-woo [SAVINA MUSEUM OF CONTEMPORARY ART]

The standout from that group is Hana, a vulture rescued after collapsing from exhaustion, born with a deformed beak that makes hunting impossible. Other works portray Sero, the zebra who climbed the bars of his enclosure at Seoul Children's Grand Park in 2023 after losing both his mother and calf; Sarah, the late Cincinnati Zoo cheetah once celebrated for her 100-meter sprint records; and a rabbit blinded in cosmetic testing, peering out from behind mascara wands rendered as prison bars.

Koh works in a signature blue-inversion technique — a process that begins with photographs from fieldwork and ends, after layers of digital painting, with almost no trace of the original photograph remaining.

The color choice is autobiographical. Koh emigrated to the United States at 13 and was the only person in his West Virginia town with black hair and dark eyes. When inverted, yellow skin tone becomes blue.

“I thought of it as the most discriminated-against color,” Koh said.

″Lost Senses″ (2026) by Koh Sang-woo [SAVINA MUSEUM OF CONTEMPORARY ART]

Blue, he added, was historically forbidden in Western painting until the Virgin Mary's mantle made it indispensable.

The exhibition's fifth-floor section gathers documentation of Koh's public-interest activities in recent years, including drawings and video recordings of past collaborations.

“Still Breathing” is curated by museum director Lee Myung-ok, who has described Koh as an artist with “a warm gaze toward the socially vulnerable.” It is presented under the Ministry of Culture, Sports and Tourism and ICOM Korea, with cooperation from the city of Cheongju. The exhibition runs until May 31.

BY LIM JEONG-WON [lim.jeongwon@joongang.co.kr]