Arario Museum | Jongno

I visit a lot of museums which allows me to visit some really fascinating worlds. Sometimes, they are amazingly weird and curious things. Sometimes, those things are peculiar and have an oh so unsubtle hint of dread and horror. All in good fun, though, I’m sure.

Arario Museum is a weird and wonderful world. At times, the weird outweighs the wonderful, like the plastic mold of an artist’s head, hollowed out and filled to the brim with the artist’s real blood. Or the sparkling deer made of glass bubbles, which looks straight from Narnia, until you peek closer and realize that underneath the translucent glass bubbles is a real taxidermy deer attached to the back of another taxidermy deer.

But, then there are other things that are fun and spectacular. There is an entire room dedicated to Keith Haring. There are the absurd self portraits of Cindy Sherman, which are every woman’s hilarious nightmare reflected back at us. There is also the building itself, which is dreamlike with its small circular stairwells, exposed brick, beautiful, ivy covered windows and darkness/sunlight light combinations.

For the Halloween season, it is the perfect eerie museum filled with curiosities. For the rest of the year, well…you should go just for the experience alone. There’s plenty to chat about afterwards.