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From 3 October 2026 to 7 February 2027, the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art (SFMOMA) presents RM x SFMOMA: Between You and Me, the first museum exhibition devoted to works from the personal art collection of RM – leader of BTS.

Bringing together nearly 200 works – around three quarters from RM’s collection and one quarter from SFMOMA’s holdings – the exhibition spans art from the 13ᵗʰ century to the present, with a particular emphasis on Korean modern and contemporary art. It also marks RM’s first collaboration with a museum as co-curator, working alongside América Castillo and Hyoeun Kim.

RM x SFMOMA: Between You and Me introduces a distinct approach to exhibition-making, taking the personal experience of a collector as the starting point for a broader dialogue with the public. Rather than being shaped by market trends or a fixed academic thesis, RM’s collection has developed through a sense of personal resonance with everyday beauty, nature and reflections on human existence.

The collection also reveals an engagement with art grounded in history, personal memory and Korean cultural identity. By placing foundational figures such as Kim Whanki and Yun Hyong-keun alongside artists associated with Dansaekhwa (단색화) – the Korean monochrome-painting movement – and other generations of modern artists, the exhibition traces a continuous thread through Korean art from the 20ᵗʰ century into the contemporary period.

In the work of Kim Tschang-yeul (1929–2021), the recurring image of the water droplet conveys the accumulated weight of time. His work is placed in dialogue with Tony Feher’s installation It Seemed a Beautiful Day (2002). Both artists turn to water as a means of approaching painful historical memory: the Korean War in Kim’s work, and the attacks of 11 September 2001 in Feher’s. The pairing demonstrates how an ordinary material can carry profoundly different associations with memory, loss and recovery.

Another dialogue extends beyond formal affinities and emerges from an actual relationship between two artists. Yun Hyong-keun and Donald Judd met in 1991, after which Judd became an important advocate for introducing Yun’s work to an international audience. When Yun’s Burnt Umber & Ultramarine (2001) is shown alongside Judd’s To Susan Buckwalter (1964), their seemingly minimal forms reveal two distinct approaches to constructing space. The pairing also brings into focus one of the recurring ideas running through Between You and Me: the encounters, influences and connections that form between people.

Seen as a whole, the exhibition offers another perspective on RM’s creative life while positioning major figures in Korean art – including Kim Whanki, Yun Hyong-keun, Kim Tschang-yeul and Yoo Youngkuk – within a broader dialogue with international modern art.

Words: Hồng Ánh
Translation: Art Nation