Damien Hirst show draws 540,000 visitors, setting all-time record at MMCA Seoul

A solo exhibition by British contemporary art icon Damien Hirst at the National Museum of Modern and Contemporary Art (MMCA) Seoul has closed as the most-attended standalone show in the museum's history.

MMCA announced Monday that "Damien Hirst: No Truth But Everything Is Possible," which ran from March 20 to Saturday, drew a cumulative audience of more than 540,000 over 96 days.

Total attendance reached 541,889, with a daily average of 5,645 visitors — surpassing last year's blockbuster "Ron Mueck" exhibition, which drew about 530,000 visitors.

The show was Hirst's first solo exhibition in Asia and one of the most talked-about art events of the year both domestically and internationally. Hirst is widely regarded as one of the most provocative figures in contemporary art history.

The exhibition brought together more than 50 works spanning over four decades of Hirst's career, from 1984 to 2026, exploring his enduring preoccupations with death, life, and the complexity of human emotion and desire. Three of his most celebrated works — "A Thousand Years," "The Physical Impossibility of Death in the Mind of Someone Living" and "For the Love of God" — were shown in Asia for the first time.

Visitors in their 20s and 30s accounted for 62 percent of total attendance, reflecting strong interest from younger audiences. Teenagers made up 12 percent — a striking figure given that they typically represent around 6 percent of the museum's visitors, meaning their share more than doubled. The surge underscored the exhibition's educational draw, giving students a chance to see in person works they had previously encountered only in textbooks.

Foreign visitors accounted for 6.5 percent of total attendance. By nationality, Europeans made up 25 percent of international visitors, followed by Chinese at 24.7 percent and Americans at 16.9 percent.

New MMCA memberships also jumped after the exhibition opened, rising more than 3.3 times compared with the period before the show's launch.

The exhibition also generated strong buzz on social media. Posts related to the show across MMCA's official channels — Instagram, Facebook, YouTube and X (formerly Twitter) — recorded a combined 7.25 million impressions. Merchandise tied to the exhibition, including shark-motif eco bags and spin-painting grip holders, drew 61 percent more buyers than the Ron Mueck show, reaching 53,806 customers, while total sales revenue nearly tripled.

Visitor reviews shared on social media captured the breadth of reactions the show inspired. "It's as controversial as it is famous, but even as a non-expert I felt like it was speaking to our lives," one post read. Others called it "a model of contemporary art that I can't fully understand but somehow can't stop thinking about" and "the most intense exhibition I've seen recently." Visitors at the gallery wrote that it was "amazing and moving to see in person works I only knew from art class," that the show offered "a chance to follow an artist's unique gaze as he grapples with both reverence for life and the emptiness of its end," and that they were "deeply drawn to his lifelong, relentless questioning of life and death."

A special talk program, "A Conversation with Damien Hirst," in which the artist engaged with audiences about his practice, sold out every seat within one second of reservations opening.

MMCA Director Kim Seong-hee said it was encouraging that the exhibition — prepared through years of close discussion with Hirst — had resonated so widely with the public, raising awareness of the artist and his work while making the diverse perspectives and debates of contemporary art more accessible to general audiences. "The National Museum of Modern and Contemporary Art will continue to present exhibitions by leading Korean and international contemporary artists, so that the public can encounter a wide range of contemporary art with ease," she said.