LG to sponsor Guggenheim’s move for tech-based art

LG Group, South Korea’s No. 4 conglomerate, is set to support the Guggenheim’s move for technology-based art as the consumer electronics-to-chemicals chaebol aims to promote the brands of its affiliates.

LG and the Guggenheim on Wednesday in New York announced a five-year, multifaceted collaboration to research, honor and promote artists working at the intersection of art and technology. They unveiled the LG Guggenheim Art and Technology Initiative, an investment in technology as an artistic medium, which will enable the contemporary art museum to broaden its investigations into this innovative field.

“The LG Guggenheim initiative will provide essential support to the visionary artists who inspire new understanding of how technology shapes and is shaped by society,” said the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum’s Deputy Director and Chief Curator Naomi Beckwith in a statement.

LG Corp., the group’s holding company, LG Electronics Inc., the world’s top home appliances maker, and LG Display Co. among the conglomerate’s affiliates will support the Guggenheim by 2027.

TO PROMOTE BRANDS IN GLOBAL MARKETS

The group will help usher in a new wave of digital creativity, combining cutting-edge solutions from LG Electronics and LG Display with the unmatched artistic sensibilities of the Guggenheim.

Their brands will be exposed in tickets, brochures and websites of the museum worldwide during the period.

“The cooperation with the Guggenheim museums established in many continents will improve LG brands in the global market,” said an LG Corp. official.

The initiative will establish the LG Guggenheim Award, a prize of $100,000, which will recognize one artist annually for their groundbreaking achievements in technology-based art.

LG Electronics will discover new artists with the Guggenheim while supporting an LG Electronics Assistant Curator, who will actively develop and support the museum's engagement with digital and technology-based art. This newly-created, research-based position will promote a deeper understanding of the ways contemporary artists are engaging with computer-based hardware, the internet, augmented and virtual reality software, artificial intelligence, the metaverse, and other burgeoning technologies. 

LG Display is set to sponsor the Guggenheim's annual Young Collector's Council (YCC) Party, held by supporters of the museum, showcasing its latest technology of transparent organic light-emitting diode (OLED).

Write to Shin-Young Park at nyusos@hankyung.com
Jongwoo Cheon edited this article.