SongMi Kim

SongMi Kim (born 1972, Busan, South Korea) lives and works in Prague. From 1992 to 1998, she studied sculpture at Sungshin Women's University in Seoul (MFA, Prof. Jeong Kwan-Mo). After moving to the Czech Republic, she continued her studies in glass at the Academy of Arts, Architecture and Design in Prague in the studio of Prof. Vladimír Kopecký (2005–2007) and subsequently at the Secondary School of Applied Arts for Glassmaking in Valašské Meziříčí (2007–2011). She has also worked in education, serving as an assistant at Sungshin University in Seoul and later as an assistant in the glass studio at Tomáš Baťa University in Zlín (2017–2018, Prof. Petr Stanický).

A recurring theme in her work is the position of women in society: her very first solo exhibition in Seoul (In Sex and Castle, 1997) reflected the significant gender inequality in Korean society at the time, and the series Koko, koko… KOKODÁK! (2019), first presented in its comprehensive form at Galerie Kuzebauch, builds upon this theme. She is the recipient of several awards, including 1st prize in the Craftsmanship and Art in Glass competition (Nový Bor, 2006), the Czech Glass Society Prize (Kamenický Šenov, 2008), and the RONA Glassworks Prize as part of the Nova Gallery Prize (Bratislava, 2011). Her work is represented in public collections in the Czech Republic and abroad (e.g., the Museum of Decorative Arts in Prague, the glass museums in Nový Bor and Kamenický Šenov, the Museum of Glass and Jewellery in Jablonec nad Nisou, and the Kunstsammlungen der Veste Coburg).