Miru Kim is an artist, photographer, illustrator, and arts events coordinator, who has explored, documented, and photographed various urban settings such as abandoned subway stations, tunnels, the Croton aqueduct

Croton Aqueduct

The Croton Aqueduct or Old Croton Aqueduct was a large and complex water distribution system constructed for New York City between 1837 and 1842...

, Paris catacombs, factories, hospitals, and shipyards. Kim's Naked City Spleen series of photographs include images of herself nude in these settings. For her new series, called The Pig That Therefore I Am, she has visited industrial hog farms and immersed herself amongst the pigs. She's the daughter of contemporary South Korean philosopher Young-Oak Kim (aka Do-ol

Do-ol

Doh-ol is the pen name of the contemporary South Korean philosopher Young-Oak Kim . He was born June 14, 1948 in Cheonan....

).

Kim was born in Stoneham

Stoneham, Massachusetts

Stoneham is a town in Middlesex County, Massachusetts. Its population was 21,437 at the 2010 census, down from 22,219 in 2000. The town is the birthplace of Olympic figure skating medalist Nancy Kerrigan and is the home of the Stone Zoo.- History :...

, Massachusetts

Massachusetts

The Commonwealth of Massachusetts is a state in the New England region of the northeastern United States of America. It is bordered by Rhode Island and Connecticut to the south, New York to the west, and Vermont and New Hampshire to the north; at its east lies the Atlantic Ocean. As of the 2010...

 in 1981 but was raised in Seoul

Seoul

Seoul , officially the Seoul Special City, is the capital and largest metropolis of South Korea. A megacity with a population of over 10 million, it is the largest city proper in the OECD developed world...

, Korea

Korea

Korea ) is an East Asian geographic region that is currently divided into two separate sovereign states — North Korea and South Korea. Located on the Korean Peninsula, Korea is bordered by the People's Republic of China to the northwest, Russia to the northeast, and is separated from Japan to the...

. She moved back to Massachusetts in 1995 to attend Phillips Academy

Phillips Academy

Phillips Academy is a selective, co-educational independent boarding high school for boarding and day students in grades 9–12, along with a post-graduate year...

 in Andover

Andover, Massachusetts

Andover is a town in Essex County, Massachusetts, United States. It was incorporated in 1646 and as of the 2010 census, the population was 33,201...

 and moved to New York City

New York City

New York is the most populous city in the United States and the center of the New York Metropolitan Area, one of the most populous metropolitan areas in the world. New York exerts a significant impact upon global commerce, finance, media, art, fashion, research, technology, education, and...

 in 1999 to attend Columbia University

Columbia University

Columbia University in the City of New York is a private, Ivy League university in Manhattan, New York City. Columbia is the oldest institution of higher learning in the state of New York, the fifth oldest in the United States, and one of the country's nine Colonial Colleges founded before the...

. In 2006, she received an MFA

Master of Fine Arts

A Master of Fine Arts is a graduate degree typically requiring 2–3 years of postgraduate study beyond the bachelor's degree , although the term of study will vary by country or by university. The MFA is usually awarded in visual arts, creative writing, filmmaking, dance, or theatre/performing arts...

 in painting from Pratt Institute

Pratt Institute

Pratt Institute is a private art college in New York City located in Brooklyn, New York, with satellite campuses in Manhattan and Utica. Pratt is one of the leading undergraduate art schools in the United States and offers programs in Architecture, Graphic Design, History of Art and Design,...

.

Kim was featured in Esquire

Esquire (magazine)

Esquire is a men's magazine, published in the U.S. by the Hearst Corporation. Founded in 1932, it flourished during the Great Depression under the guidance of founder and editor Arnold Gingrich.-History:...

s 2007 Best and Brightest issue

The Financial Times

Financial Times

The Financial Times is an international business newspaper. It is a morning daily newspaper published in London and printed in 24 cities around the world. Its primary rival is the Wall Street Journal, published in New York City....

 of London

London

London is the capital city of :England and the :United Kingdom, the largest metropolitan area in the United Kingdom, and the largest urban zone in the European Union by most measures. Located on the River Thames, London has been a major settlement for two millennia, its history going back to its...

 included Kim in an article titled "We'll climb that bridge when we get to it" about "urban explorers," people who scale bridges and roam subway tunnels, storm drains, derelict factories, sewers, steam vents and other forbidden city infrastructure.

External links

• Kim's web site
• Buzzell, Colby. "Miru Kim Takes Pictures". Esquire, 20 November 2007.
• Gibberd, Ben. "Children of Darkness". New York Times, 29 July 2007.
• Miru Kim's photos
• O'Connor, John. "We'll climb that bridge when we get to it". Financial Times, 14 December 2007.
• TED Talks: Miru Kim's underground art of New York's urban ruins at TED
  TED (conference)
  TED is a global set of conferences owned by the private non-profit Sapling Foundation, formed to disseminate "ideas worth spreading"....
  
  in 2008