Displaying "Growth and Development": Exhibit Hall 3, National Museum of Korean Contemporary History

What should a "museum of contemporary history" display? If a museum's collection leads all the way up to the present—as the National Museum of Korean Contemporary History (NMKCH) aspires to do—then it is apt to fall into the trap of a teleological interpretation of history. As many scholars in museum studies have pointed out, all museums are inherently intertwined with politics; what one displays and how one displays it are often contested issues with much at stake.¹ For a nation that went through a tumultuous period of colonial rule, civil war, military coup d'état, and mass revolt throughout much of the twentieth century, displaying its contemporary history is likely to become a hotbed of controversies over conflicting interpretations of recent history. Nowhere else does George Orwell's dictum in 1984 ring truer: He who controls the past controls the future; he who controls the present controls the past.

The NMKCH is located in the heart of downtown Seoul, across the street from Gyeongbokgung Palace and adjacent to the United States Embassy in Korea² (fig. 1). The museum overlooks Gwanghwamun Square, where millions of protesters gathered for the candlelight protests through the fall and winter of 2016–2017. If you are a visitor to Seoul, it is quite likely that you will pass by the museum during one of your guided tours. The neighborhood is flush with powerful institutions—government offices, media companies, and corporate headquarters. Indeed, the site of the NMKCH building used to house the Ministry of Culture, Sports, and Tourism until the museum opened its doors in 2012. Before that it was home to the Economic Planning Board and the Supreme Council for National Reconstruction.³ In short, the very location of NMKCH is heavily loaded with symbolism in Korean contemporary history.

Fig 1.

The external view of the National Museum of Korean Contemporary History. To the right of the museum building is the northern corner of the United States Embassy in Korea. (Source: Photo courtesy of NMKCH)

Origins and Layout

From the initial stages, the NMKCH was embroiled in political controversies. In the early planning document prepared in 2010, the museum planners made it abundantly clear that the primary purpose of the museum was to "instill national self-esteem" about Korea's modern and contemporary history by emphasizing the nation's proud accomplishments in the face of "countless trials and tribulations."⁴ Naturally, the need to "instill national self-esteem" arose from the perception that it was sorely lacking. The political context for this perception was the ten-year rule (1998–2008) of two left-wing presidents (Kim Dae-jung and Roh Moo-hyun), considered by their political opponents as embracing a historical viewpoint that denies the very existence of the Republic of Korea. Thus, when Lee Myungbak of the right-wing Grand National Party assumed the presidency in 2008, establishing a contemporary history museum was pursued with a sense of urgency.⁵ In other words, the NMKCH emerged as a central site of left-right political struggles in South Korea over historical interpretations of the recent past.

Given its origin as a pet project of a right-wing president, it is perhaps understandable that the overall narrative offered by the NMKCH follows the view generally favored by his supporters. The eight-story building is comprised of two temporary and four permanent exhibit halls. The four permanent exhibits are displayed on the third (Exhibit Hall 1), fourth (Exhibit Hall 2), and fifth (Exhibit Halls 3 & 4) floors, so that visitors can watch successive exhibits by hopping onto escalators.⁶ Exhibit 1, titled "Prelude to the Republic of Korea," covers the period between the Treaty of Ganghwa (1876), which opened the ports of Chosŏn for commercial trade with Japan, to the liberation of Korea from Japanese colonial rule (1910–1945). Exhibit 2, titled "The Basic Foundation of the Republic of Korea," begins with the left-right confrontation in the immediate postliberation period and goes on to display the establishment of the Republic...