Continuing through the industrial streets, we stop into what could almost pass for a gallery but turns out to be a clothing store: Mo-No-Ha. Within the voluminous, minimal interior, an employee in a long white lab coat helps me purchase a boxy black button-down with matching shorts in a techy fabric that looks cut from a parachute.

Seongsu-dong is where we encounter Punto Blu, another multipurpose gallery, and meet the space’s co-founder and art director Jane Lee. Punto Blu offers a tabula rasa of sorts for creatives of all mediums. “Everything can be built up or taken down,” explains Lee, “so that whoever wants to present their identity can really push their colors forward, and we can morph to their visions.” Punto Blu hosts art shows, performances, and music events, and even collaborates with luxury fashion brands and government cultural institutions. She explains the history of the bokhapmunhwagonggan, the Korean multiconcept space (the literal translation is “complex cultural space”). This concept evolved around five years ago out of a desire to have avant-garde spaces but also a need for financial sustainability, resulting in the fusion of gallery/cafe or cultural hub/bar. She provides context on the inaccessible history of the Korean art market, formerly limited to the elite and shrouded in corruption — art as assets for money laundering, art as a way to obscure. “But the nature of art is not like that,” she states. “The nature of art is to break boundaries and connect. I think that is why all these experimental spaces began, to speak to the people outside of the castle.”

Driven by the nation’s youth, Seoul’s art market is now booming. For years, Lee explains, the country’s goal was survival, with the nation severely wounded and the economy hard hit after the Korean War of 1950 to 1953. Industrial conglomerates rose up after the war, and simply executing corporate tasks was the path to success, followed by saving, buying a house, and having children. But with homes and schools becoming increasingly unaffordable, compounded by corporations no longer offering the same decades-long support to their employees, a cultural pendulum swing is currently in motion.

“The youth decided,” continues Lee, that “rather than just dreaming about this vague future unsupported by the system, to support themselves at this moment and actually consider their current tastes — investing more in the space they live in now, rather than the possible home they might not even be able to get. The rising art markets are in response to these new demands.”

The next day, we meet up with Korean-American artist Mark Yang. Yang’s colorful, anatomical paintings focus on abstracted male nudes in various studies of movement. In many ways, the style is a product of his desire to be a sculptor, he says. “A lot of my paintings have a bit of a sculptural quality, and it’s because I think a lot about the planes, the dimension, and the space.” In depicting male nudes versus the historically gazed-upon female nude, his work inadvertently challenges gender norms. He was always interested in intimacy, the concept of sensuality versus sexuality, and an aspect of platonic touch that he feels is missing in today’s Western male society. In this way, Yang’s depictions of nude male figures physically engaged with one another confront our societal norms of who can be objectively studied — who can touch who.

We connect at Gwanghwamun — the main gate of the sprawling Gyeongbokgung Palace, completed in 1395 — a grand marker of Seoul’s new role as capital city after the founding of the Joseon dynasty. The opening to the ancient royal compound is lined with oxblood columns and topped by a double-tiered roof, ornately carved and painted in shades of green with gold Korean characters. We walk through the historic square, passing women in hanbok, the traditional Korean dress marked by voluminous baby doll–cut skirting and a wrap-style upper. Their figures dot the dusty expanse like spinning tops in shimmering shades of emerald, peach, and lilac.

Yang takes us to art hub Boan 1942, featuring an exhibit full of little mechanical robots engineered by artist Moonjung Hwang. The space is a raw, unrenovated former inn in the historic Bukchon Hanok Village. Upstairs is a slick store where I leaf through compact art books with technicolor covers. Next, we stumble upon a vintage shop at the end of an alley, Wish You Were Here, a treasure trove of delicate pieces with a tiny cafe tucked to the side. We continue to Barakat Contemporary, which Yang explains is an excellent example of a noncommercial gallery — meaning the art isn’t catering to buyers (no paintings or sculptures one could easily picture in their home). Instead, the large, stony setting features more experimental work, like sound art.

We end with dinner at Hwangsaengga Kalguksu for kalguksu, knife-cut noodles in a rich broth, beef-stuffed mandu (dumplings), and chilled bowls of red (spicy) and white (not spicy) kimchi. Slurping on floor mats over a low table, we discuss the unique qualities of Korean culture and identity — its pride and insularity, juxtaposed in equal parts by its warmth and hospitality. It’s all a bit foreign to me, having grown up in New York with a limited connection to my mother’s heritage — except for the food, of course. “I need to eat Korean food once a week,” I admit, “or else I get sick. Other foods begin to make me nauseous.” Yang bursts into laughter over his kalguksu. “That’s so Korean,” he chuckles.