작업 소개

국립현대미술관 윤범모 관장이 들려주는 소장품 10분 강좌로, 작가 12명의 작품을 매주 수요일 Youtube LIVE 를 통해 공개하였다.

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10분 영상으로 만나는 소장품, 열린강좌 – 미술관소장품강좌
국립현대미술관 윤범모 관장이 들려주는 소장품 이야기

1. 오지호 Oh Jiho, 남향집 Sunny Place, 1939
2. 장욱진 Chang Ucchin, 마을 Village, 1956
3. 안중식 An CHoongsik, 산수 Landscape, 1912
4. 정찬영 Jung Chanyoung, 공작 Peacock, 1937
5. 이인성 Lee Insung, 카이유 Kaiyu, 1932
6. 최욱경 Choi Wook-Kyung, 환희 Joy, 1977

Oh Jiho, Sunny Place, 1939

Did you all see the blue shadow?
You would expect a shadow to be painted in black. Yet there is a painting that portrays the shadow of an old tree in blue. It is the work by Oh Jiho.

In Oh’s , painted around 1939 when the artist was in Gaeseong, the shadow of an old tree, standing in the front yard of a thatched-roof house, is expressed not in black but in blue. The work interprets the landscape in an unusual manner. Due to his mastery of a unique impressionist style, Oh Jiho is recognized as one of the greatest painters in Korean modern art history. In his interpretation of nature through painting, how did this artist achieve such an original sense of color?

There is the term “Green Sun” It is an issue linked to the Impressionist style. Impressionists considered sunlight very important. After the new vessel called the paint tube was invented, artists could easily take their paint outdoors. While working outdoors, they began to capture the importance of sunlight in their picture-planes. They began to include the subtle changes of the sunlight, and its various properties. Oh Jiho’s is a perfect example.

Blue shadows. If we look more closely at the painting, we can see part of the thatched-roof house, the warm sunlight filling the yard, a dark, old tree positioned in the center of the picture-plane, the shadow of the tree, stones stacked up in the foreground, a white dog dozing in the yard, and a girl in red, exiting through the open door of the house. She is said to be the artist’s daughter. In later years the artist recalled, “Those were the happiest, most beautiful days of my life in Gaeseong.”

During that decade in Gaeseong, Oh built the foundation from which he would rise to prominence on the art scene. He became a teacher at Songdo High School, as a replacement for his close friend Kim Jukyoung. Around the time Oh was painting , he also published, together with Kim Jukyoung, a color catalog titled 『Oh Jiho & Kim Jukyoung Duo Catalog』. This book was one of the first attempts in Korea to print an art catalog in color. And the landscapes and figures by the two artists in the book were works that attested to the new painting styles, such as Impressionism, that were emerging in Korea. Oh Jiho demonstrated a singular life journey as an artist, living in his hometown of Gwangju, working rigorously, and educating many students.

He lived a life of twists and turns, including the unusual experience of living in the Jiri Mountains during the Korean War, and being imprisoned following the May 16 military coup. He enjoyed horse riding, and was extraordinarily devoted to promoting the use of Chinese characters, for which he even organized exhibitions to raise funds for the Chinese character revival movement.

How to interpret nature? With independent perspectives and interpretations. Blue shadows, inviting us to contemplate on the artistic qualities and originality of the artist: This was , by Oh Jiho.

Chang Ucchin, Village, 1956

Chang Ucchin… The artist‘s name seems to give off calm reverberations. In particular, Chang Ucchin’s works are very small. Exaggerating just a bit, one may say he made palm-sized works. The subject matter of his works is very simple as well. The artist himself often commented, “I am simple.” Likewise, the contents of his paintings are very simple, and the methods of expression also are very simple. Sometimes they look like children’s paintings. They are works one can appreciate easily and without burden. Nevertheless, they have a profound philosophical background. This is one of the unique charms of Chang’s paintings. Artist Chang Ucchin. Today we will look at a work titled Village, painted by the artist in 1956.

Shall we first look at the formative features? Seen as a whole, it is a village. However, it is by no means a conventional portrayal of a village. Large trees are painted in the upper and lower sections to compose the picture-plane,with two green trees in the upper part, and a single tree in the lower part, with houses on each side of it. In composition, the canvas is divided horizontally into two sections. In the lower left corner there is a large house with a human figure in the center, filling the entire space. As you can see, it is not a photograph-like representation, but a scene staged according to the artist’s free interpretation. Take a closer look at the tree, and you can see that all of its branches are visible.

Unlike more common examples, where parts of trunks and branches are covered by leaves, We can see the trunk and all the branches in Chang’s painting. It is a expression of the skeleton. Moreover, the branches are painted symmetrically. It seems that he did this to give a sense of stability. While portraying the overall shape of the tree against a green, rounded background, the artist has erected a powerful symmetric stem. Between the houses and the trees are a dog and other livestock, and a circle in the sky suggests a sun. However, the background color is not sky blue, but a darker tone, resembling the color of earth, indeed a peculiar color for a background.

The houses as well are not painted in bright colors, but in darker shades, and the people in the houses are also quite peculiar. They seem to fill up doors and windows, very differently from most depictions of human figures. As for the characteristics of Chang‘s painting method, you can see that he disregards the law of perspective. He has omitted portrayal of close and distant scenes, and ignored any shading technique based on a sense of volume. In other words, he has not considered depicting shadows. Instead, he has flattened his subjects. He uses a form that arranges the elements in rows, like a kind of design.

Besides village scenes, Chang Ucchin also painted many family images. Such emphasis on villages and families reflects life in the modern days of Korea. Chang studied in Japan during the colonial era, and after the war, became a professor at Seoul National University. Previously, he had worked at a museum. I imagine that this led him to recognize tradition as important nourishment for his world of work. As a child, he lived for a time at Sudeok Temple in Yesan, receiving the teachings of Priest Mangong. If we are to identify a philosophical connection with Chang’s paintings, we may say his works are linked to the Buddhist world of Zen. We can interpret them as being permeated with elements of Zen.

One of the artist‘s most famous pieces, titled Jinjinmyo, is a portrait of his wife. The figure is drawn in a simple form revealing her skeleton like an X-ray image. A typical characteristic of Chang Ucchin’s painting is that he includes all his stories simply in a small picture-plane. The magpie appears often in the artist’s works, and may be seen as a symbolic subject. Sometimes the magpies are flying in the sky, and at other times they perch on tree branches. As you know, people are fond of the magpie, because it is a messenger from the sky, bringing happy news. The birds flying in the sky are usually in pairs, another of the artist‘s characteristic painting methods to simplify and symbolize. This is a typical example of Chang’s painting style.

In his self-portrait painted during the Korean War, there is a gentleman-like figure dressed in a tailcoat, standing in a barley field, and holding a long, black umbrella. Two interpretations are possible. One is that he tried to express an ideal situation, in hopes of escaping from the miseries of war; a more critical interpretation is that it is a unique work, excluding any sense of reality.

According to the location of the artist’s studio, Chang’s career can be divided into three periods: Deokso period, Myeongryundong period, and Suanbo period, as he moved around a lot during his lifetime. Yet, he maintained a consistent painting mode: simple subjects and subject matter. His methods of expression were also minimal, portraying subjects simply, like children’s drawings. It is estimated that about 700 of his works remain, all of them made by the artist using oils. They are all masterpieces. In his later years, Chang made many drawings of various subjects using implements such as magic markers with rapid, simple strokes. Putting it simply, he made works that show the beauty of temperance.

I must say, Chang Ucchin was an artist of unusual style. While looking at his works, I feel a sense of village community spirit and love of family. Chang‘s family love was not limited to people, but embraced a broader kinship with all living things, such as trees, birds and animals, which together form the feeling of a village. His paintings give a sense of peace or a vision of utopia. Though they are small in size, their resonance is gentle and steady as they touch us within. Looking at Chang Ucchin’s small paintings, which tell us about community spirit, and particularly looking at his Village, we are moved to think about the value of community consciousness in times of hardship.

An CHoongsik, Landscape, 1912

Today we will take a look at Simjeon An CHoongsik‘s masterpiece Landscape, which is painted on a ten-panel folding screen. As you know, Simjeon An CHoongsik was one of the last artists representing the Joseon Dynasty.

Through this landscape (Sansu) painting, we can ascertain the spiritual world of noblemen in the Joseon Dynasty. While “Sansu” is literally a painting of “mountains and water,” or nature, it cannot be seen as a portrayal of existing nature. It actually is a representation on the picture-plane of the ideals of the nobleman or literary person. Because it is an expression of the mental world, rather than a portrayal of actual scenery, it is called “Sa-eui” painting, which literally means “transcribing the idea.”

Simjeon’s 10-panel screen Landscape painting can be seen as an example of typical literati painting style. Literati painting is precisely the embodiment of the literati’s spiritual world. “Literati” refers to the dynasty‘s intellectuals and dominant class. The gentry were the important intellectual leaders of society who managed the dynasty while monopolizing education. The representative genre that formatively expressed the world of these intellectuals was “literati painting,” and landscapes were its favorite subject matter. Since sansu was a painting of a utopia, rather than the real appearance of nature, it was also used by the literati as a means to self-cultivate, or develop one’s personality. Through this typical genre, noblemen sought to escape from the dusty secular world, by expressing their desire to stroll in nature through an image of their ideal world. ㅡThere is the Korean phrase “Wayu-sansu,” which means “leisurely lying down and relaxing while appreciating nature.“ It is a distinguishing feature of Korean landscape painting. We may call it the “ideal world,” a kind of summary of the mental world of the literary nobleman. Therefore sansu is a painting that asks the question, “What is literati painting?”

Looking at Simjeon’s painting, we first of all notice the peculiar formal character of the folding screen. The composition begins on the right and proceeds towards the left. On the far right is a spring scene. The distinct characteristics of each season were found in nature, and portrayed in long, vertical picture-planes. High mountains and deep valleys were painted on the upper parts of the pictures. As the mountains were mainly rocky, they were expressed in Korean ink and ink wash. From middle distance to foreground, there were thick forests.

Tall trees form mountains, and the four seasons are well presented through the changing trees, starting with the peach blossoms that adorn the spring landscape, and going on to the dark, leafy shades of summer, falling leaves in autumn, and the plum blossoms and bare branches of winter. Like the word “Sansu,” this painting is a combination of mountains(San) and water(Su). In the minds of people in the old days, if the universe could be broadly divided into two, nature could be interpreted and categorized as what moves and what does not. The mountain represented what did not move, and water symbolized movement. Among these two crucial elements of Korean landscape painting, the role of water was especially important. Therefore, in Sansu painting, expressions of water in symbolic or fluid form such as clouds or fog, and water flowing in rivers or valleys, held an important position in the work. That is why many landscape paintings contained views of waterfalls or water surfaces. Sansu painting was thus an expression of the will and desire to adapt to the laws of nature, and become one with nature, while watching the flow of water in the mountains. These characteristics and contents have been portrayed also in An CHoongsik’s 10-panel folding screen painting, through special techniques and compositions using ink and ink wash. It can be said that Sansu painting contains the awareness and highly original way of thinking that we are not separate from the changing seasons or from nature.

An CHoongsik was influenced by Owon Jang Seungeop (1843-1897), a representative artist of the late Joseon Dynasty who studied new knowldege in China, together with Sorim Cho Seokjin (1853-1920). He was very open to the new culture of the times, and even studied such things as crafts and new mechanical equipment. In particular, he played a leading role as a figure representing the art scene during the late Joseon Dynasty. In 1918 he organized the Calligraphy and Painting Association, and as its first chairman, became a symbolic figure in that sphere. Before the term “art” came into general use, “Seohwa (calligraphy and painting)” was the word used for art in the Joseon Dynasty. “unity between calligraphy and painting” was an independent idea of traditional society. It literally meant, “calligraphy and painting are of the same body.”

As “fine art” entered the land, such “Seohwa” was replaced by the new formative language of the West Simjeon An CHoongsik was a representative artist during the final peak of Joseon art, during the transition from the Seohwa era to the era of fine art, as can be seen in his famous 10-panel Landscape work. In this work, we can read the Oriental, or Northeast Asian, views of nature, and the typical symbolism of the literary spirit, according to which humans desire to become one with nature.