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57STUDIO는 국립현대미술관의 열린강좌 프로그램 중 미술관 소장품 강좌 시리즈를 제작하였습니다. 윤범모 관장이 직접 작품을 설명하는 형식으로 구성하였으며, 실제 교육 현장에서 효과적인 학습 자료로 활용될 수 있도록 제작되었습니다. 또한, 어느 장면을 캡처하더라도 교육 자료로서의 기능이 충실히 전달될 수 있도록 화면을 구성하였습니다. 이 시리즈는 작가 12명의 작품을 조명하며, 매주 수요일 YouTube LIVE를 통해 공개되었습니다.

57STUDIO produced the Museum Collection Lecture Series as part of the National Museum of Modern and Contemporary Art’s (MMCA) open lecture program. The series was structured in a format where Director Yoon Bum-mo personally explains each artwork, ensuring its effectiveness as a valuable educational resource for use in learning environments.

The videos were designed so that every frame could function as an informative material, regardless of where it was captured. This series highlights the works of 12 artists and was released weekly via YouTube LIVE every Wednesday.

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.