2009.1.5
The largest-ever exhibition of Korean modern art is running at the National Museum of Art, Deoksugung in Jeong-dong, Seoul.
"The Modern Korea Rediscovered" showcases 232 paintings and sculptures of 105 renowned Korean artists from the 1910s to 1960s, such as Park Soo-keun, Lee Jung-sub and Chun Kyung-ja.
Amid the flood of foreign art exhibitions, this one delivers messages only Korean artists can express.
"The pieces show what the Korean modern people dreamt of while suffering during a turbulent era," said exhibition curator Park Young-ran at a press conference last month.
"Looking over the artwork, visitors will be able to see that the efforts and hopes of those people was what brought the affluence today."
Taking place in both buildings, it is the museum's biggest exhibition ever. It starts at the west wing and spreads to the east wing.
"Modern Korea" is divided into five parts. The first part, named "Modern People," observes the appearances of people during the period of modernization and colonization.
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Artist Lee Kwae-dae appears in his "Self-portrait in a Korean Coat" dressed in traditional Korean hanbok. But he is wearing a Western-style felt hat. Through this juxtaposition, the artist expressed himself as a pioneering intellectual who absorbs Western culture but also reinforces his own.
Streets, homes and lifestyles of people in the early 20th century are depicted on canvases in "Modern People" and "Modern Landscape," the second and third divisions.
A modern woman in hanbok sits reading a book in Chang Woo-soung's "Atelier," an indication of a society slowly opening up to women. Only a few decades before the time of the painting, a woman reading in public was not a welcome sight, not to mention that most women were illiterate. In Chang's painting, however, the husband doesn't seem to care. He simply continues to smoke a pipe.
Moving to the next building, the exhibition invites visitors deeper into the minds of the people of those times.
The fourth division is named "Modern Dream." Because many Koreans then couldn't fully realize their dreams due to political oppression brought on by Japan's invasion, their dreams seem more special.
Lee Jung-sub had to send his wife and children away to Japan for a while because he couldn't afford to support them in Korea. Left alone in Busan and missing his family terribly, Lee painted happy thoughts of his family together on tin foil. "Children, Fish and Crab" is one of them.
Chun Kyung-ja expressed her hopes in life in "A Man Holding Dried Yellow Corvina." Rainbows and clouds of colorful paint invoke a feeling of fantasy on the canvas.
Obviously, it was not an easy job to collect and display these old and precious works of art. Many of them were seriously damaged. In the last part of the exhibition, "Restoration of the Modern," viewers can see how the frail art pieces were preserved.
Enjoy the free exhibition, watch some modern Korean movies with a sip of coffee in the old-style cafe inside the museum, and take a walk around Deoksugung. This full-course cultural experience is worth a trip.
The current exhibition runs through March 22 at National Museum of Contemporary Art, Deoksugung, in central Seoul, but is closed on Mondays. Admission for the exhibition is free but ticket to enter Deoksugung is 1,000 won. For more information, call (02) 757-1800 or visit www.koreamodern.com
By Park Min-young
(claire@heraldm.com)
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