Director Moon-Hyung Lyu graduated from the College of Business Administration at Seoul National University and worked at Samsung C&T and Samsung Electronics. He worked in Germany and the United States at the European Strategies Division and North American Support Team of Samsung Electronics. He currently serves as the director of the Samsung Foundation of Culture, where he works to improve environmental problems, communicate and cooperate with stakeholders, and implement inclusive cultural policies for social minorities with a deep interest in sustainable management.

1. How did you begin working at Samsung C&T and get to where you are today?

I wanted to work overseas when I was job searching and considering various career paths. I joined Samsung C&T because I thought it was the best company with the opportunity to work overseas. Fortunately, Samsung launched a regional specialist program at that time, and I was able to experience Germany as a regional specialist and was dispatched to the German office for 11 years, from 1995 to 2006. I then worked at the Support Team at Samsung Electronics and in New York as the head of Samsung’s North American Support Team from the end of 2014 until 2020 and then joined the Samsung Foundation of Culture.

2. Please introduce us to the Samsung Foundation of Culture.

Since its establishment in 1965 based on the philosophy of sharing of Chairman Byung-Chul Lee, the founder of Samsung, the Samsung Foundation of Culture has embarked on various art and cultural programs with the belief that art and culture can improve the quality of life and become the driving force for national development by resolving various social conflicts. The Foundation currently runs the Leeum Museum of Art and the Ho-am Art Museum and is at the forefront of specializing and globalizing art projects through exchanges and cooperation with renowned global art galleries.
The value of culture has become more important than ever, and international cultural exchange is indeed a solid foundation for creating new values. Samsung Foundation of Culture continues to play its role as the cultural leader of the twenty-first century by promoting the excellent culture of Korea and actively supporting international cultural exchanges.

3. We are interviewing you at the Leeum Museum of Art, which has only held permanent exhibitions for four years since 2017, to reopen in 2021. What were your goals at that time?

The Leeum Museum of Art opened in 2004 and celebrates its 20th anniversary next year. Our goal during the COVID-19 pandemic, as we prepared to reopen the museum, was to become a “global hub for arts and culture.” To become a global hub for arts and culture instead of limiting ourselves to domestic events, the Leeum Museum of Art first changed its Museum Identity (MI) to a more dynamic design and transformed the museum space and facilities to a modern style. This is an effort to create a museum that engages with audiences from a more global perspective. There are a number of projects currently in motion to achieve this goal.
The Foundation also introduced environmental, social, and governance (ESG) management, intending to become an ESG-practicing organization in tandem with the global interest in the responses to climate change and the pursuit of sustainability. Exhibitions at art museums produce a significant amount of waste. In the past, the partitions we threw away after exhibitions amounted to 30 tons. We use modularized partitions and have reduced the waste to 4.5 tons these days. We will continue to reduce our carbon footprint in various ways wherever possible and fulfill our ESG goals in the future.


4. The Samsung Foundation of Culture signed an agreement with Seoul Foundation for Arts and Culture last June, announcing that it will provide more opportunities to experience the culture for a wider population as a nonprofit foundation. Do you have other projects planned in that respect?

We decided to create more opportunities to show our collection to as many people as possible because we thought the number of visitors was somewhat lacking compared to the number of works housed in our museums. First, we embarked on a tour of the Leeum Museum of Art’s exhibitions so our exhibition could reach out to viewers outside Seoul. Human, 7 Questions, which was a special exhibition commemorating the reopening of the museum, was on tour at the Jeonnam Museum of Art in Gwangyang, Jeollanam-do, and Metallurgy at Ho-am Museum of Art was also on tour at national museums in Cheongju and Gimhae.
We have recently created special museum hours for teenagers and college students for special exhibitions so that they can appreciate art without other viewers during the hours, under the belief that teenagers and people with disabilities who have difficulties in visiting museums should be given more opportunities to do so. We also run regular programs for people with disabilities on Mondays when the museum is closed to ensure that the museum is barrier-free and accessible to people with disabilities. We also play the role of a nonprofit foundation by creating various forms of sign language videos for visitors with disabilities and providing tickets for people of national merit or the socially disadvantaged.

5. What differentiates the Samsung Foundation of Culture from other cultural foundations?

First of all, we pursue different values. Samsung Foundation of Culture was founded to encourage people to appreciate arts and culture by sharing the cultural assets collected by our founding chairman and former chairman with society. The artworks, which had been collected to fulfill the goal of “protecting the national spirit with culture,” are now “heritages,” as they are cherished by so many people. This is what differentiates Samsung Foundation of Culture from other organizations.

6. What would you like to do if you become a university student again?

I want to study in earnest. I considered going to graduate school before joining Samsung, so if I become a student again, I would like to go to graduate school and study abroad to gain a deeper academic insight.


7. Can you walk us through your day as a director?

Work begins at 9 am, so I come to the office at 7 am and read books until nine. I learn about programs and how to run art museums through books and have often implemented what I have read in practice. For instance, the “Different Perspective Program,” where museum members view one artwork each Friday and have discussions on the work, is a program inspired by the books I read.
Once work begins, I tackle both internal and external tasks. Internally, I receive reports from each department and participate in various board meetings, such as the ESG board, the museum management committee, and the board of director meetings, where I inform board members of the major projects at the Foundation and engage in discussions. Externally, I often meet important guests visiting from other countries or cultural institutions or participate in events hosted by other organizations. Because there are branches other than art in culture, such as music and dance, it is important to meet the heads of various cultural institutions to share cultural trends and issues. I tend to make the time to view exhibitions with the visitors or participate in education programs to gauge the audience’s reactions and make improvements. I also host town hall meetings and other opportunities to meet my staff members and listen to their opinions, especially those of our younger staff members.

8. What is the most memorable book you have read?
Dawn of the New Type by Shu Yamaguchi. This book impressed me so much that I shared my summary of the book with my staff members. According to the author, there were so many problems to solve before the 1990s that it was the people or corporations that found “answers” to the problems that became successful. However, now that the world has become wealthier, the people who find the “problems” instead of those who seek the answers are more likely to succeed. Once you identify the problem, you can easily find the answers anywhere online or on YouTube. Our problem is that we do not know what the “problems” are. So whoever is quicker at identifying the problems can be successful, and the same applies to companies. Then who can identify the problems quickly? According to the book by Shu Yamaguchi, exposure to arts and culture makes you spot these problems faster than others. I highly recommend this book, Dawn of the New Type, to you.

9. Do you have any final words of advice for students at the Business School?

I believe many of you spend a lot of time and energy on job searching. I hope you can slow down and experience many new things to adapt to the rapidly changing world. I also hope you can make some time to find an interest and explore more about arts and culture.