Sketch of the Gabriel Orozco Gardenby Gabriel Orozco (Courtesy of the artist and Leeum Museum of Art)
The Leeum Museum of Art has unveiled the Gabriel Orozco Garden, transforming its outdoor deck into a designed garden by the Mexican artist.
It marks the museum’s first commissioned garden project since its opening in 2004.
The project redefines the deck as public ground, shifting away from its vertical space that had a focus on monumental works by artists such as Alexander Calder and Anish Kapoor toward a horizontal public space.
“This garden is not about spectacle or monumentality, but about endurance over time — it reflects a form of art that changes slowly, yet continuously,” Kim Sung-won, deputy director of the museum, said on the newly opened garden.
Aerial view of Gabriel Orozco Garden at Leeum Museum of Art (Courtesy of the artist, museum)
Open to the public during museum hours, the garden is structured around a circular geometry that expands from a single motif into interconnected forms, creating ten distinct plazas.
Using Boryeong stone — quarried in Boryeong, South Chungcheong Province — reclaimed wood and pine, plum and bamboo in a minimal design, the garden emphasizes material continuity and seasonal endurance, according to the museum.
The project in Seoul marks the artist’s third and most comprehensive exploration of the garden as a sculptural medium after his transformation of a neglected site at the South London Gallery in 2016 as his first garden project.
Known for working across sculpture, photography and installation, Orozco has built an international reputation through subtle interventions in everyday materials and sites, often guided by geometric systems and chance.
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