10 2012 Vol. 37 l Varition of Dexterous Line: Encounter of Reality and Ideal Kyung Mo Lee, art critic Unbound by space, form or color, Sohan Sam Young Lee has endeavored in applying a new method for Ko- rean painting on canvas by defining objects with line. His line is rendered as an element of life that defines an object through the process of connecting dots and planes and that exists by itself. He brings in a new life to the object and air to the space with the variation of line that stems from one stroke. His art suggests a possibil- ity for true communication between reality and ideal without too much techniques or ostentatious rhetorics. Early in his career, Sohan condensed nature with brush stroke so that the canvas was infused with lib- eral modernist logic and traditional Korean aesthetic. The young artist who attempted to probe the object’s construction and cubist composition that swayed from traditional spatial concept, or the concept of margin, provided a basic form of the figure and defined the space additionally but very naturally. Regardless of the subject - whether it is the figure or landscape - the artist represented the objects with mystical line that was me- dium of expression as opposed to a boundary defining the object, and took its role as line, form and color. The line in his works is more of a vehicle that defines the object’s materiality and carries out the artist’s feelings than a simple boundary. His perspective is mirrored in his experimental fig- ure drawings during the 1970’s. In particular, the Girl painted in 1970 boasts lively usage of ink that suggests colors and modern sensibility. The women in his oth- er drawings of this period, Bathing, Beach, and Model, appeared in the utopia and reflected the young artist’s view on the economically and politically dark reality. He evoked humanity that reflected the history and sig- nificance of our land by representing our life and land truthfully as the period’s record keeper. In the zenith of his career during 1980’s, he raised a static scenary to a lively movement with rough vertical lines. His paintings of the time represented an energetic and raw world that broke from the conceptual conven- tion of Korean painting. His fast drawings that captured the exotic landscape and impression from travels under limited time were free but carefully condensed the ob- jects. The works of 80’s were modern reinterpretation of the impression and landscape from travel, his drawings after 1990’s were based on the Korean tradition and his effort to redefine it in his own way. In this way, he enhanced the quality of painting by adding the dignity of literati painting to the construc- tive space founded on dexterity. Sohan’s landscape that inherits the traditional Korean realistic landscape and represents modern perspective and expression, pri- marily consists of marine scenary. The ocean seems to be the most familiar subject to the artist who spent his entire life in Incheon and is realized in his own unique way. The figures in nature and city in Lee’s recent works are not merely supporting element but an experiment of form and material through the variation of line. His figures convey mystical air with truthful represen- tation, exotic atmosphere and modernist formal exper- iment. His perspective is lively and appealing while the figures are rendered in an unconventional manner. The contrast between figures and background evokes del- icate tension. His focus is revealed in the contradiction of truthful representation and abstract expression and in his effort to capture the subject’s psychological sta- tus as well as characteristics. It is his artistic desire that extends the sensuality of female nude to realistic life and the inner depth of the character. The aesthetic characteristics of Soohan’s painting re- vealed in the energy represented in the wave of line, the formless space created by the subject’s perspective, tangible and intangible forms that appear in the space. These forms take an important role as being contra- puntal with the subject. They are the epitome of pure and absolute beauty proclaimed by abstract painting, but at the same time define the aesthetic elements in the canvas such as line, form, color and harmony. The abstract is a major part of the artist’s recent works that attempt a reinterpretation of subject through sensa- tional line. Unruled by the conventional method of ink painting, the artist is headed to a new experiment which focuses more on defining and reinterpreting the subject than on its representation. Additionally Lee prefers the de- scription rendered with the traditional materials and tools with confidence and belief in the outcome no in- ferior to Western painting. Therefore, his works typically described by the perspective of western painting, nat- uralistic description of watercolor, and lively expression of form with line and expressive mass. This is why Lee’s painting fascinates us; the mixture of contradicting elements, technique and anti-technique, reality and conception, East and West, and tradition and modern. This is not something far away from us but our reality and story as everyone finds special memo- ries in his works. Lee, Sam Young solo Exhibition PLACE Gallery LA MER DURATION 24-30october 2012 ARTIST Lee, Sam Young CONTACT TEL +82.2.730.5454 ‘Adhesion Paradox’ Seung Chul Lee’s Solo Exhibition Seung Chul Lee (born 1964, South Korea) currently serves as a painting professor at the College of Arts at Dongduk Women’s University. He earned a BFA and an MFA in Asian Painting from Seoul National University. For the past two decades, Lee has been investigating hanji at Gansong Art Museum. Hanji literally means ‘Korean paper,’ symbolizing both its geographic origin and the uniquely Korean production techniques and methods used to make it. Founded by Jeon Hyeong- pil in 1938 in order to prevent Japanese imperialists removing Korean cultural properties from the country, the Gansong Art Museum is the first private modern museum in Korea. The museum collection includes many old Korean paintings and objects that have been designated national treasures. After his undergraduate study, Lee began researching hanji in order to produce a strong style in Asian paint- ing, advocating hanji paper as a decisive aesthetic el- ement of Asian painting. Lee raised questions about whether the kind of traditional-styled paper available at that time, which he was using for his painting, was actually produced using authentic traditional methods. These questions led him to his research of hanji, which got fully underway in his MFA thesis paper, The Impacts of Hanji on Painting. While writing the thesis, he dis- covered that knowledge of hanji production methods had been lost to history. Consequently, he set up a workshop and operated it for six months to recover the knowledge of traditional Korean paper production. He began collecting hanji relics with his research at Gansong Art Museum in the early 1990s. Initially he be- gan the collection in order to analyze hanji productions methods, and the collection has grown to 8,000 items over the past 20 years. No longer able to manage or re- search the collection by himself, he donated it to the Historical Museum in Wonjoo, his hometown, in order to share hanji materials with others and to revive hanji culture with a broader audience. When Lee began studying hanji, he was mostly inter- ested in paper in natural colors, but later investigated how to produce a broader range of colors with natural dyes after having been exposed to examples of colored paper from the Joseon Dynasty (1392-1897). Lee is convinced that nature is the fundamental origin of human aesthetic sensibility. Thus, aesthetic objects are found in natural objects, which in his case specifi- cally mean the Korean natural colors he has learned to produce. For Lee, a natural color exists without instru- mental purpose, and is itself an aesthetic element that is distinctive and universal. He challenges himself to present this beauty and share it with others: the ques- tion is how. The exhibition raises the question: In what specific form does an installation have to be construct- ed in order to represent the particular beauty found in Korean natural colors? In other words, the exhibition attempts to represent the natural beauty of Korea found in particular colors by means of a specific form of installation art. This question involves two layers of differences. One is that between a man-made form and the natural beauty found in particular colors. The other is the difference between Western and Far East Asian cultures, considering that installation art is an art form developed in Western countries and considering that the subject matter in question is geographically limited, ‘Korean beauty,’ in the sense of a beauty that is found in the Korean natural environment. By focusing on the beauty of Korean natural colors, Seung Chul Lee identifies Koreans as a people of na- ture. He expresses this through a form of western con- temporary art, in which Korean thoughts and cultural elements exist as a dormant possibility waiting to be explored and realized. The current four experimental pieces by Lee are just a beginning of the exploration of this potential Korean aspect of installation art that I wish the artist to fully unfold in the near future. J.P. Zukauskas contributed reporting from New York. PLACE Gong Art Space DURATION 5-16 october 2012 ARTIST Lee, Seung Chul CONTACT +82.2.735.9938 09 Vol.334SEPTEMBER 2012 ᨖᦝᎃᦎ៛ᤙ ᣝᦜᦉ ᜀ 10.24Wed - 10.30Tue 2012 GALLERY LA MER 3F 월간 미술세계 기획 이삼영 초대전 갤러리 라메르 서울시 종로구 인사동 194 홍익빌딩 02 .730.5454 미술세계 컬쳐오션
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10 2012 Vol. 37l
Varition of Dexterous Line: Encounter of Reality and Ideal Kyung Mo Lee, art critic Unbound by space, form or color, Sohan Sam Young Lee has endeavored in applying a new method for Ko-rean painting on canvas by defining objects with line. His line is rendered as an element of life that defines an object through the process of connecting dots and planes and that exists by itself. He brings in a new life to the object and air to the space with the variation of line that stems from one stroke. His art suggests a possibil-ity for true communication between reality and ideal without too much techniques or ostentatious rhetorics. Early in his career, Sohan condensed nature with brush stroke so that the canvas was infused with lib-eral modernist logic and traditional Korean aesthetic. The young artist who attempted to probe the object’s construction and cubist composition that swayed from traditional spatial concept, or the concept of margin, provided a basic form of the figure and defined the space additionally but very naturally. Regardless of the subject - whether it is the figure or landscape - the artist represented the objects with mystical line that was me-dium of expression as opposed to a boundary defining the object, and took its role as line, form and color. The line in his works is more of a vehicle that defines the object’s materiality and carries out the artist’s feelings than a simple boundary. His perspective is mirrored in his experimental fig-ure drawings during the 1970’s. In particular, the Girl painted in 1970 boasts lively usage of ink that suggests colors and modern sensibility. The women in his oth-er drawings of this period, Bathing, Beach, and Model, appeared in the utopia and reflected the young artist’s view on the economically and politically dark reality. He evoked humanity that reflected the history and sig-nificance of our land by representing our life and land truthfully as the period’s record keeper. In the zenith of his career during 1980’s, he raised a static scenary to a lively movement with rough vertical lines. His paintings of the time represented an energetic and raw world that broke from the conceptual conven-tion of Korean painting. His fast drawings that captured the exotic landscape and impression from travels under limited time were free but carefully condensed the ob-jects. The works of 80’s were modern reinterpretation of the impression and landscape from travel, his drawings after 1990’s were based on the Korean tradition and his effort to redefine it in his own way. In this way, he enhanced the quality of painting by adding the dignity of literati painting to the construc-tive space founded on dexterity. Sohan’s landscape that inherits the traditional Korean realistic landscape and represents modern perspective and expression, pri-marily consists of marine scenary. The ocean seems to be the most familiar subject to the artist who spent his entire life in Incheon and is realized in his own unique way. The figures in nature and city in Lee’s recent works are not merely supporting element but an experiment of form and material through the variation of line.
His figures convey mystical air with truthful represen-tation, exotic atmosphere and modernist formal exper-iment. His perspective is lively and appealing while the figures are rendered in an unconventional manner. The contrast between figures and background evokes del-icate tension. His focus is revealed in the contradiction of truthful representation and abstract expression and in his effort to capture the subject’s psychological sta-tus as well as characteristics. It is his artistic desire that extends the sensuality of female nude to realistic life and the inner depth of the character. The aesthetic characteristics of Soohan’s painting re-vealed in the energy represented in the wave of line, the formless space created by the subject’s perspective, tangible and intangible forms that appear in the space. These forms take an important role as being contra-puntal with the subject. They are the epitome of pure and absolute beauty proclaimed by abstract painting, but at the same time define the aesthetic elements in the canvas such as line, form, color and harmony. The abstract is a major part of the artist’s recent works that attempt a reinterpretation of subject through sensa-tional line. Unruled by the conventional method of ink painting, the artist is headed to a new experiment which focuses more on defining and reinterpreting the subject than on its representation. Additionally Lee prefers the de-scription rendered with the traditional materials and tools with confidence and belief in the outcome no in-ferior to Western painting. Therefore, his works typically described by the perspective of western painting, nat-uralistic description of watercolor, and lively expression of form with line and expressive mass. This is why Lee’s painting fascinates us; the mixture of contradicting elements, technique and anti-technique, reality and conception, East and West, and tradition and modern. This is not something far away from us but our reality and story as everyone finds special memo-ries in his works.
Lee, Sam Young solo Exhibition
PLACE Gallery LA MER DURATION 24-30 october 2012 ARTIST Lee, Sam YoungCONTACT TEL +82.2.730.5454
‘Adhesion Paradox’Seung Chul Lee’s Solo Exhibition
Seung Chul Lee (born 1964, South Korea) currently serves as a painting professor at the College of Arts at Dongduk Women’s University. He earned a BFA and an MFA in Asian Painting from Seoul National University. For the past two decades, Lee has been investigating hanji at Gansong Art Museum. Hanji literally means ‘Korean paper,’ symbolizing both its geographic origin and the uniquely Korean production techniques and methods used to make it. Founded by Jeon Hyeong-pil in 1938 in order to prevent Japanese imperialists removing Korean cultural properties from the country, the Gansong Art Museum is the first private modern museum in Korea. The museum collection includes many old Korean paintings and objects that have been designated national treasures. After his undergraduate study, Lee began researching hanji in order to produce a strong style in Asian paint-ing, advocating hanji paper as a decisive aesthetic el-ement of Asian painting. Lee raised questions about whether the kind of traditional-styled paper available at that time, which he was using for his painting, was actually produced using authentic traditional methods. These questions led him to his research of hanji, which got fully underway in his MFA thesis paper, The Impacts of Hanji on Painting. While writing the thesis, he dis-covered that knowledge of hanji production methods had been lost to history. Consequently, he set up a workshop and operated it for six months to recover the knowledge of traditional Korean paper production. He began collecting hanji relics with his research at Gansong Art Museum in the early 1990s. Initially he be-gan the collection in order to analyze hanji productions methods, and the collection has grown to 8,000 items over the past 20 years. No longer able to manage or re-search the collection by himself, he donated it to the Historical Museum in Wonjoo, his hometown, in order to share hanji materials with others and to revive hanji culture with a broader audience.
When Lee began studying hanji, he was mostly inter-ested in paper in natural colors, but later investigated how to produce a broader range of colors with natural dyes after having been exposed to examples of colored paper from the Joseon Dynasty (1392-1897).Lee is convinced that nature is the fundamental origin of human aesthetic sensibility. Thus, aesthetic objects are found in natural objects, which in his case specifi-cally mean the Korean natural colors he has learned to produce. For Lee, a natural color exists without instru-mental purpose, and is itself an aesthetic element that is distinctive and universal. He challenges himself to present this beauty and share it with others: the ques-tion is how. The exhibition raises the question: In what specific form does an installation have to be construct-ed in order to represent the particular beauty found in Korean natural colors? In other words, the exhibition attempts to represent the natural beauty of Korea found in particular colors by means of a specific form of installation art. This question involves two layers of differences. One is that between a man-made form and the natural beauty found in particular colors. The other is the difference between Western and Far East Asian cultures, considering that installation art is an art form developed in Western countries and considering that the subject matter in question is geographically limited, ‘Korean beauty,’ in the sense of a beauty that is found in the Korean natural environment. By focusing on the beauty of Korean natural colors, Seung Chul Lee identifies Koreans as a people of na-ture. He expresses this through a form of western con-temporary art, in which Korean thoughts and cultural elements exist as a dormant possibility waiting to be explored and realized. The current four experimental pieces by Lee are just a beginning of the exploration of this potential Korean aspect of installation art that I wish the artist to fully unfold in the near future. J.P. Zukauskas contributed reporting from New York.
PLACE Gong Art Space DURATION 5-16 october 2012 ARTIST Lee, Seung Chul CONTACT +82.2.735.9938
09 Vol.334 SEPTEMBER 2012SINCE 1984 · Monthly Art Magazinewww.mise1984.com
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