Centre Pompidou to Open Seoul Outpost as Global Expansion Continues
The Centre Pompidou will open a new outpost in Seoul on June 4, aligning the launch with the 140th anniversary of diplomatic relations between France and Korea. The project, called Centre Pompidou Hanwha, is a joint initiative with the Hanwha Foundation of Culture and the latest addition to the Paris museum’s growing international network.
French President Emmanuel Macron visited the site on April 3 with culture minister Catherine Pégard and Laurent Le Bon, the president of the Centre Pompidou. The partnership was formalized in the summer of 2023 under the French Ministry of Culture and the Ministry of Europe and Foreign Affairs, confirming that the institution’s overseas footprint was expanding again after years of speculation.
The Seoul venue will be located in Tower 63, the Hanwha group headquarters, and designed by French architect Jean-Michel Wilmotte. According to Hanwha, the collaboration will run for four years and include eight monographic exhibitions, with two presented each year from the Centre Pompidou collection. The agreement also gives Hanwha the right to use the museum’s name during that period, with an option to extend the contract.
Reports in Korean media and Le Monde have placed the licensing fee at €20 million, or roughly $23.1 million. For the Centre Pompidou, the deal arrives at a consequential moment: its main Paris campus is closed for a five-year renovation and is not scheduled to reopen until 2030.
The Seoul opening is part of a broader push abroad. KANAL – Centre Pompidou in Brussels is expected to open soon, and Le Bon recently finalized a separate partnership in Saudi Arabia to develop a contemporary art museum in AlUla. Together, those projects suggest a strategy that pairs cultural reach with financial support during the Paris closure.
Not every expansion has survived. In February, the institution abandoned its planned satellite museum in Jersey City after sustained local opposition and the disclosure of a $255 million deficit in the city’s budget. Jersey City mayor James Solomon was blunt about the decision: “We will not be doing Pompidou, to be clear. It is dead.”
As the Paris museum undergoes renovation, its overseas projects are becoming central to its public identity — and to the question of how major museums extend their influence beyond their home cities.
