A grinning, slightly mischievous tiger bounding across a Netflix animation may feel like a thoroughly modern creation.
But at Gallery Hyundai in central Seoul, South Korea, visitors are invited to trace that character’s lineage back centuries to a visual tradition shaped by royal authority, village humour and everyday wishes for good fortune.
Two concurrent exhibitions – “Magnificence and Creativity: Variations in Korean Folk Painting” and “The Way of Painting” – open a dialogue between past and present, showing how Joseon-era court and folk art continue to ripple through contemporary culture.
The old images behind a new animation
The connection feels especially timely for fans of “KPop Demon Hunters”, whose breakout character Derpy the Tiger borrows directly from the expressive language of traditional Minhwa, a local term that translates to “painting of the people” or “popular painting”.
A report from Yonhap News Agency cited that the main gallery space anchors the experience in history, presenting 27 large-scale court and folk paintings from the Joseon Dynasty (1392–1910).
Many are usually hidden, museum-quality works that reveal the genre at its most ambitious.
Towering among them is “Two Dragons and Pearl”, a 19th-century court painting created to ward off evil, its paired dragons circling a pearl that symbolises royal legitimacy and cosmic order.
Nearby, “Ten Symbols of Longevity” gathers mountains, clouds, cranes and other auspicious motifs into a single visual wish for health and prosperity – a reminder that painting once served as both decoration and talisman.
The lineage becomes more playful in “Magpie and Tiger”, where the tiger’s exaggerated expression and comic presence offer a clear ancestor to today’s animated feline heroes.
YOU MAY ALSO LIKE: Inclusivity in dolls – Mattel launches autistic Barbie
Minhwa’s enduring sense of play
Folk paintings brimming with wit and imagination can be found on the second floor of the main building, capturing ordinary lives with humour and gentle satire.
In “Bird, Flower and Figure”, Joseon women in hanbok – a traditional Korean clothing – appear with caricature-like features, their charm rooted in subtle exaggeration.
That spirit carries into the gallery’s new building, where six contemporary artists reinterpret traditional aesthetics.
Works by Kim Ji-pyeong and Bak Bang-young, among others, show how the free brushwork and daring compositions of late Joseon Minhwa still inspire artists navigating the present.
Marking a decade since Gallery Hyundai’s landmark 2016 show on court and folk traditions, the exhibitions suggest that Derpy the Tiger is less a pop-culture novelty than the latest incarnation of a centuries-old visual language – one that continues to evolve, grin intact.
Both exhibitions run through February 28.
READ NEXT: The saddest day of the year: What is Blue Monday?
Sarah Sharp 
Anna Ferraz