Art on Fire

by Yun Ko-eun, Lizzie Buehler (Translator)

A darkly comic and compelling satire of the art world from the author of The Disaster Tourist.

An Yiji’s career had been stalling for some time when a representative of the illustrious Robert Foundation offers her a spot on their all-expenses-paid artist residency in California. The residency has launched many famous artists’ careers, so she knows she can’t waste this opportunity. Still, she feels reluctant to accept, and with good the foundation’s patron is a small dog named Robert, known for both his talent as a photographer, but also his arrogance. Moreover, the offer comes with a on the last day of the residency, one of An’s paintings must be incinerated, and Robert gets to select which one.

When An reaches California, she finds the state ablaze with wildfires, but at the Foundation all is calm. She navigates awkward dinners with Robert, tries to find inspiration while being bombarded with sponsors who all want their business to be the subject of her art, and despairs at the prospect of her work being set on fire. Was coming to California a huge mistake?

Genres: Fiction, Literary Fiction, Art, Satire, Contemporary

256 pages, Paperback

Published October 14, 2025

About the author

Yun Ko Eun is her pen name and her real name is Ko Eun-ju. She was born in 1980 in Seoul, South Korea. She studied creative writing at Dongguk University. She made her literary debut in 2004 when she won the 2nd Daesan Collegiate Literary Prize. In 2008, she won the 13th Hankyoreh Literary Award for her novel Mujungryeok jeunghugun (무중력증후군 The Zero G Syndrome). She has published three short story collections: Irinyong siktak (1인용 식탁 Table for One), Aloha (알로하 Aloha), and Neulgeun chawa hichihaikeo (늙은 차와 히치하이커 The Old Car and Hitchhiker)—and the novel Bamui yeohaengjadeul (밤의 여행자들 Travelers of the Night).

Reviews

[Blair · Rating 4 out of 5]

A struggling Korean artist is invited to a prestigious American foundation whose patron is a dog. A charming absurdist comedy with a climate change angle, this is pitched as ‘a satire of the art world’ but I’m not sure I could tell you what aspects of the art world it was satirising. It’s one of those freewheeling, difficult-to-pin-down novels in which the central concept can be summed up succinctly, but the book’s true nature is much looser. Funny in an oddball way, with a likeable if slightly too inert protagonist. Reminded me particularly of Radio Iris by Anne-Marie Kinney.

[Kathie Yang · Rating 4 out of 5]

i’m between 3 and 4 stars for this one… captured my attention with the premise but found the ending just ok. overall this book just made me REALLY on edge which i kind of hated but i can acknowledge it takes a lot of talent to do so!! like i definitely felt a whole range of emotions! annoyance, confusion, generally just weird!

i recommend reading this if you like murakami and the woman in the dunes kind of style (a little surreal?) mixed with some commentary on capitalism, classism, art, and climate change.

oh ps this book mentions untitled (perfect lovers) though which omg <33

rating: 3.5 stars

[Patty · Rating 3 out of 5]

So so engrossing and super funny, but really sputters out by the final third. Worth a read but a bit of a missed opportunity

[Paul Fulcher · Rating 4 out of 5]

Last day of exhibition: incineration of one piece by artist, to be chosen by the Robert Foundation.

전시회 마지막 날에 작품 중 하나를 소각한다. 소각할 작품은 로버트 재단에서 선택한다.

Incineration?
I wondered if 'sale' had somehow been mistranslated as 'incineration' or maybe there'd been a printing error. But no - they really did mean that the art was to be burned. It wasn't a metaphor.

소각?
혹시 ‘구매’가 ‘소각’으로 잘못 번역된 것은 아닌지, 인쇄상의 오류가 아닌지 의심했는데 그건 정말 작품을 불태우는 행위 그자체를 가리키는 것이었다. 은유나 상징의 표현도 아니었다. 정말 불태운다고 했다.

Art on Fire is Lizzie Buehler's translation of 불타는 작품 by 윤고은 (Yun Ko-eun), following The Disaster Tourist and Table for One from the same translator/author.

The novel - part slapstick satire of the modern art scene, part intelligent ekphrastic writing, and 100% frogadabbadobulously bonkers (© Smashie) - has the narrator, 안이지 (An Yiji), a promising but relatively unsuccessful author invited to the US to be artist-in-residence at the Robert Foundation (로버트 재단), named after and managed by a famous photographer and art-collector. The only two catches:

1. as per the quote above from the Foundation's rule book, one of the artist's 10 pieces produced on the residency will be selected by Robert and publicly burned.

2. Robert is a dog, from the papillon breed.

The trip to the Foundation also proves tricker than Yiji expected, and Robert an arrogant host, communication made rather complex by the layers of translation, including a human who interprets Robert's barks and body language:

Our conversation was made possible by four separate stages of translation: Robert → black box → Danny → English-English interpreter → English-Korean interpreter → me. Even if I spoke English completely fluently, Sam later told me, they would have hired an interpreter. Interpreters considered more than just the flow of language; they provided a certain security. For safety rea-sons, Robert's words passed through several checkpoints before reaching me. If I were a native English speaker, that would have removed only one of the checkpoints. Multiple stops existed between artist and patron.

Not helped by the English-Korean interpreter deciding to alter what is said to please Robert, '상여놀이' becoming 'supercar':

Some might have seen his impact as a disaster lying in wait, but I thought that in some ways, hed unexpectedly helped me and Robert. For example, when my sentence I painted a picture of sangyeo nori, traditional Korean casket performances was translated from Korean to English, it became, T'm very interested in traditional Korean supercars, and Robert was hooked. 'Supercar' was one of Rober's favourite words. He asked me several times about traditional Korean supercars.
'Is the Korean supercar you're painting from a long time ago?" he asked.

At the time, I had painted neither a Korean supercar nor a funerary casket, and I had no intention of doing so. I was so focused on this point that I forgot the content of the conversation. In response, I said, Not from a long time ago — it'll be a modern supercar.'

The Korean word for modern, hyundae, sounded like the car brand Hyundai, so the interpreter thought I was talking about Hyundai Motors. Referring to Hyundai rather than modernity wasn't a small incident. The topic of funerary rites had now turned into a new supercar that Hyundai was making. Robert and I had the entire conversation without him realising that we were talking about different things.

Modern art plays a key role in the text - the work that Yiji makes as the centrepiece of her exhibition, and which Robert selects to burn, is inspired by 'Merda d'artista' by Piero Manzoni



And the narrator has some Ship-of-Thesues like musings on the Foundation's, and Robert's, longevity inspired by Nam June Paik's 'Sonatine for goldfish'



Not entirely successful - in part as it wasn't clear what the author meant success to be - but stimulating, entertaining and very different.

[Helen | readwithneleh · Rating 4 out of 5]

I first came across Yun Ko-Eun when I read her climate fiction, DISASTER TOURIST, back in 2020 when it was released. I was pleasantly surprised by her satirical commentary on climate change and environmental tourism. That book was slim but wild—it’s one I really enjoyed and recommend often.

ART ON FIRE is a very different book but has similar satirical and witty tone with Disaster Tourist specifically around the commentary for climate change and public consumption. In DISASTER TOURIST, Yun explores the fascination, exploitation and ultimately, destruction of nations existing on the periphery of the imperial core due to ecotourism and the public’s role as complicit spectators and tourists. In ART ON FIRE, she both expands and narrows in on the idea of public consumption and engagement through an artist and her patron.

An Yiji makes ends meet by working as a food delivery person. She’s long abandoned her dreams of making a living as an artist, so when she is recruited and accepted into an all-expenses paid artist’s residency at the Robert Foundation in Palm Springs, she knows it is an opportunity she cannot pass up. Still, she is apprehensive. After all, the head and patron of the foundation is a discerning and eccentric photographer who just happens to be a dog, a papillon named Robert. She’s also uneasy about the fact that one of her works, chosen by Robert, will be incinerated at the end of her residency per the rules of the Foundation. But knowing this residency has launched the careers of many famous artists, she sees no other option but to accept.

The way Yun poses nature and art, and how they impact one another is really interesting, especially when set against capitalism as driving force. While nature usually serves as inspiration for art, in this book it also plays a role as a barrier to the public consumption and commodification of art. A lot happens in this book with a lot of themes being explored, and it’s done with humor and wit. I did struggle with the pace in the middle and wanted more focus look at critique of the intersectionality of cultural elitism and climate change. Still, similar to DISASTER TOURIST, I thought this was a very unique premise and overall, a really entertaining read. And I am continually impressed with the seamless translation of Lizzie Buehler. I would definitely recommend to anyone who enjoys surrealist fiction, especially to those who want to explore more Korean translated books.


Full review here.

[Anne Morgan · Rating 5 out of 5]

'Art on Fire' by Korean writer, Yun Ko-eun. This book is surreal. It's a satirical look at the world of art. It's a 'make you stop and think' book. It's fun, perturbing, clever, discomfiting, unbelievable and believable all at the same time. It's a reflection of modern life, culture and the way mass hysteria seems to take over society at whim with everyone jumping on the extreme bandwagon of believing something is really good (REALLY GOOD and no-one is allowed to think otherwise) or really bad (REALLY BAD and no-one is allowed to think otherwise).
Chapter one tells the story of a photograph and how the photographer accidently captured an image that went viral.
Chapter two feels like the chapter one of a completely different book as we meet the Korean artist An Yiji. She has been struggling financially and just started to do 'walking deliveries' via an app to earn some money. Out of the blue she is offered an all-paid retreat at the Robert Foundation in California. The Robert Foundation is known for making artists' careers and so this isn't something she can lightly turn down.
She arrives in California as wildfires rage cutting her off from the foundation. She gets through this, and through the fires, and arrives at the Foundation. That's when it gets surreal and perturbing. It's also when we learn that chapter one hadn't mistakenly been added to the front of this book.
I really enjoyed this book and I'm still thinking about it more than a week after finishing it. The ending slightly let it down, but other than that, I loved it.

[Sharon Mensing · Rating 4 out of 5]

Occasionally I read a book that keeps my interest in part by making me wonder how an author actually came up with the story line, and how they manage to accomplish writing the book. This is one of those times. The author has presented the reader with a book that manages to be compelling in spite of making very little realistic sense. Although the roots of the novel are grounded in reality, dealing with issues such as climate change, the pretentiousness of art criticism, and the nature of identity, the actual premise of the book's plot is absurd in the extreme. Nonetheless, I found the book highly engaging.

The book follows the story of a young Korean artist, Ahn Yiji, who spends her time working as a delivery person until she is recruited as The Robert Foundation's new artist in residence. When she travels to LA to begin her fellowship, she is confronted with massively destructive forest fires and is unable to reach her final destination as planned. From this point on, things become more and more strange as the book finds its place somewhere along the absurd-satirical-surreal borderline. The author effectively uses fire as a metaphor for thoughts throughout the book and uses Robert (the dog), ostensibly the force behind the foundation, as a stand-in for the indefinable nature of art, individuality and reality.

If you like your fiction realistic, this is not for you. If you like trying to tease the underlying meaning out of sometimes nonsensical narratives, you'll love this. I liked it quite a bit and rated it higher than average.

[Glen Helfand · Rating 2 out of 5]

I didn't read the book jacket closely enough. All I saw was the setting of an artist residency, Palm Springs, and California fires. Those things piqued my interest, were in my scope of art world interests and experience of artist residency weirdness and the desert landscape. What I didn't take note of was this: "the Foundation's president and patron is a small dog named Robert, known for his talent as a photographer and his arrogance." I wasn't expecting this to be an absurdist satire, a sci-fi dystopian adventure with random plot points that are foisted upon a hapless Korean painter. The outlandish inventions in the plot points are wacky and non-sequitur metaphors. What does it mean to have a patron be a dog? That the Hollywood sign would be a mutable thing and corporations rule nefariously? That delivery apps can be an espionage tool or escape route? Or that dogs can be trained not to shit? The theme of burning is a constant-- the landscape is on fire, and a stipulation of the residency is that one of the artworks, chosen by the dog, will be incinerated in a pizza oven. There are desert mall scenes, but no mention of a California Pizza Kitchen. . . .

[Stuart Iversen · Rating 5 out of 5]

I picked this off a bookshop shelf kind of at random, but what a beautifully surreal book it is. Its skewering of the art world reminded me a lot of Peter Strickland's Flux Gourmet, a film I really loved.

[Nadirah · Rating 3 out of 5]

Rating: 3.75

I think this one worked better as a satire compared to "The Disaster Tourist". All the allusions to the art world's idiosyncrasies reminded me a lot of Banksy's stunt of destroying the artwork someone bought off him (as he should). Wonder if the author was inspired by that.

[Abby · Rating 3 out of 5]

I hate a book where the plot surrounds a magical dog and no other mystical elements. Like why

[Nic Maltrotti · Rating 4 out of 5]

don’t take this review as a recommendation

[Stuart · Rating 4 out of 5]

Having owned a Papillon made this all the more believable

[Alexandria · Rating 3 out of 5]

the absurdity of the story kept me engaged but i can’t say i felt satisfied after reading it. i think there were some metaphors present about the gap between the people who make contemporary art and the people who fund said art. but i wasn’t quite fully connecting with it.

[Sunny]

About half way through, but decided not to finish the book.
Am I missing something? but this reads like non-sense: unless the author is trying to say that art is non-sense.....