EBS Seo Jang-hoon's Millionaire Next Door: Art museum couple in Gangneung, Yeongwol, and Samcheok turns 13 years of deficits into a destination for 300,000 annual visitors

[EBS Seo Jang-hoon's Millionaire Next Door]

"Sold a sculpture for 1.25 billion won" The secret behind Choi Ok-young and her husband's success in building a hot place visited by '300,000 people a year' after 13 years of deficits! "Making money from trash?!"

- Land artist Choi Ok-young's eventful life, from 'cement factory employee to owner of 3 art museums'! "Even my spoons were swept away by Typhoon Rusa..." - Seo Jang-hoon, whose 'father graduated from art school,' claimed to have no talent for drawing... but proves his 'art DNA' with a self-portrait drawn on a milk carton?! "Expressing my loneliness"

'Seo Jang-hoon's Millionaire Next Door' highlighted the success secrets of the couple Choi Ok-young and Park Sin-jeong, 'art museum millionaires' who broke the boundaries between nature and art. The two have practiced 'win-win art' by sublimating discarded waste into artworks and going beyond personal success to breathe vitality into the region, delivering a deep resonance through their unique 'wealth philosophy.'

The episode of EBS 'Seo Jang-hoon's Millionaire Next Door' broadcast on the 7th featured land artist Choi Ok-young and sculptor Park Sin-jeong, the 'couple who makes money by turning trash into art.' The two operate three art museums in Gangneung, Yeongwol, and Samcheok in Gangwon Province, receiving a total of 500,000 visitors every year. On this day, Seo Jang-hoon and Jang Ye-won personally visited the studio of Choi Ok-young, a 'pioneer of Korean land art.' Her original world of work, which adds artistic imagination to common waste to breathe new life into it, stood out. Choi Ok-young draws self-portraits on milk cartons as if writing a daily diary, and reincarnates them into three-dimensional sculptures using waste tires. Instead of a brush, she used fish cake skewers that were discarded after events. At Choi Ok-young's suggestion, Seo Jang-hoon and Jang Ye-won also challenged themselves to draw 'milk carton self-portraits.' In particular, Seo Jang-hoon expressed lack of confidence, saying, "My father graduated from art school, but I have no talent for drawing," but he caught everyone's attention by showing unexpected drawing skills with the explanation, "I expressed my loneliness."

Next, Choi Ok-young's overwhelming land art, unfolded using nature as a canvas, was revealed. The museum in Gangneung, designed so that the sea can be seen from anywhere, drew admiration, with comments like, "They sculpted an entire mountain of 156,000 pyeong into a work of art." Choi Ok-young stated, "I designed it so that the sea would be the center, thinking that the best artwork is nature." The shape of the museum site, which looks like a bird when viewed from the sky, also provided a unique sight. In addition, ingenious works could be found everywhere, such as a mysterious coral reef path made of red hoses and blue waves made of food packaging plastic wrap. Another museum in Yeongwol, which was selected as one of the '2020 Stars of Korea Tourism,' is also attracting visitors with original land art works. From a work that uses 6,000 red pipes to shape a bamboo forest, creating a strong complementary color contrast with the surrounding green nature, to a massive work that reproduces planets of the universe with a height of 15m and a width of 12m, it boasted an extraordinary scale.

Due to difficult family circumstances, Choi Ok-young entered a commercial high school to find employment. After entering the world of art through the active recommendation of an art teacher who recognized her talent, she stood out in national competitions. Later, she worked at a cement company in Samcheok, and with that salary, she entered a newly opened national university art school in Gangneung. After marrying Park Sin-jeong, whom she met at an exhibition, she spent about 10 years creating her first art museum by renovating an old abandoned school. However, Typhoon Rusa, which struck in 2002, swept away everything the couple had painstakingly built, without leaving even a single spoon. This became the turning point for the couple to dream of land art that coexists with nature and is resilient even against typhoons. To build a new museum, they poured in not only Park Sin-jeong's retirement pay but also all the proceeds from artwork sales and loans. In particular, Choi Ok-young surprised everyone by naming the statues of Shin Saimdang and Yulgok Yi I at Ojukheon as her most expensive sold works, saying, "It was sold for 1.25 billion won back in 2009."

After four years of preparation, they finally opened the museum doors, but they struggled so much that people said, "There were fewer visitors than employees," and they could not escape the swamp of deficits for 13 years. Nevertheless, the couple endured the long period of deficit by refining their works and continuing new attempts. As a result, the museum in Gangneung has established itself as a representative local landmark visited by 300,000 people annually and an average of 800 people per day, and is also contributing to the revitalization of tourism in Gangwon Province. Choi Ok-young expressed, "I feel joy when the museum plays a role in attracting outside visitors, and the income obtained from there goes to the residents, thereby helping the local economy." Currently, the couple is taking on another challenge by preparing their third museum in Samcheok. They plan to breathe vitality into the region by reconstructing abandoned industrial facilities into cultural spaces. The story of Choi Ok-young and Park Sin-jeong, who turn trash into art, ruins into cultural spaces, and art museums into new growth engines for the region, left a deep impression.

EBS 'Seo Jang-hoon's Millionaire Next Door' airs every Wednesday night at 9:55 PM, and after the broadcast, it can also be watched on OTT platforms such as Netflix and Wavve.

Read the original (Korean)