When RM of BTS was named global ambassador for the National Museum of Korea in June 2026, his first official move wasn't a photoshoot — it was a quiet walk through a special exhibition of an 18th-century painter named Kim Hong-do (김홍도). Within hours, a Joseon-dynasty artist was trending with fans worldwide asking the obvious question: who is this guy, and why does the biggest name in K-pop care?
Joseon's superstar painter
Kim Hong-do (1745-1806), better known by his pen name Danwon (단원), was the defining painter of late Joseon Korea. He had the royal gig — court painter to King Jeongjo, trusted with state ceremonies and royal portraits — and the range: landscapes, flowers and birds, Buddhist subjects, documentary court scenes. Korea's National Museum currently gathers 96 of his works in one hall, from misty seascapes to a painting of a Pyongyang governor's banquet crowded with more than 2,500 individual figures.
But that's not why Koreans love him.
The painter of ordinary people
Ssireum (씨름, Wrestling), from Kim Hong-do's Treasure-designated genre album.
National Museum of Korea collection — public domain.
Kim Hong-do's immortal works are his pungsokhwa (풍속화, genre paintings) — quick, warm, funny scenes of everyday Joseon life. The Treasure-designated Danwon pungsokdocheop album includes the two images every Korean grows up with: Ssireum (씨름), where a ring of spectators leans into a wrestling match — including one distracted snack vendor — and Mudong (무동), a boy dancing mid-leap to a folk band.
No kings. No idealized mountains borrowed from Chinese manuals. Just people — laughing, straining, showing off. In an era when "serious" art meant looking away from daily life, Kim Hong-do pointed straight at it and found it worth painting. That's why the RM connection lands: an artist documenting the texture of ordinary Korean joy is, functionally, the great-great-grandfather of every fancam, variety show, and slice-of-life music video K-culture exports today.
The RM effect
Fans have long tracked RM's museum visits the way they track photocard prices — his gallery posts routinely send attendance soaring, a phenomenon Korean museums openly call the "RM effect." The ambassador appointment made it official policy: Korea is using its biggest pop export to route global attention toward its classical culture. Judging by the crowds at the Kim Hong-do exhibition — BTS leader one week, packed galleries the next — it works.
Seeing it yourself
- The exhibition: Danwon Kim Hong-do: Painting an Era, National Museum of Korea (Seoul), through August 2, 2026 — 50 titles, 96 works, including 11 leaves of the genre album. Admission is free.
- Plan around it: if you're flying in for a concert anyway (see our survival guide to Korean ticketing), the museum is a subway ride from most of Seoul — and the gift shop's museum-goods line has become a fan collectible in its own right.
- From abroad: the museum's online collection database serves high-resolution scans of the genre album — the paintings are public domain, and the details (check the snack vendor) reward zooming in.
Facts in this article are drawn from Korea's official policy briefing (Ministry of Culture, Sports and Tourism, July 2026).