Kim Yong-Ik was born in 1947 in Seoul and currently lives and works in Yangpyeong, South Korea. From 1999 to 2012, Kim was a professor in the Painting Department of Gachon University (formerly Kyungwon University)'s College of Art and Design. He is also a founding member of Art Space Pool, an alternative space established in Seoul in 1999, where he served as the director from 2004 to 2006. Kim was the subject of a comprehensive retrospective that examined his 40-year-long practice at Ilmin Museum of Art in Seoul in 2016. His work is included in a number of public and private collections including Leeum, Samsung Museum of Art (Seoul), Tokyo Metropolitan Art Museum, the Museum of Contemporary Art Los Angeles and the Los Angeles County Museum of Art.