Page 53 - artview21 eBook Art Magazine 2023 September issue4

Artist’s Statement
Ink Wash Painting and Light-colored Pen Painting

Terms such as dongyanghwa (동양화, 東洋畵, Eastern painting) and a single word. This only can be represented in painting. Even though I
seoyanghwa (서양화, 西洋化, Western painting) were coined as Western have ascended mountains all over the country, I feel and see something
art was introduced to Korea. These terms were established and used new every time. Ascending one of the celebrated mountains like
in the curriculum of art education during the Japanese occupation. Seoraksan or Samgaksan that is adjacent to my residence, I have been
These are not presently used in Japan, but still used in Korea. Painting working with concerns about how to represent aesthetic feelings and
can be classed as ink wash painting, oil painting, and watercolor emotions I feel in the mountains. Paintings by Jeong Seon and Kim
painting depending on materials. And yet, this classification may be Hong-do harmoniously depict living aspects of the time alongside
of no significance if it is used indiscriminately. We only need to call nature in concert with figures. The figures don’t look over nature but
this painting. The reason why I ramble on about this is because this feel and stay with nature, assimilated with it.
exhibition brings together two genres of paintings that are unlikely to
suit each other. I began engaging in light-colored ink painting when traveling
extensively in Europe in 2004. I initially illustrated European scenes in
Since my junior high and high school days, I have primarily painted ink wash painting, but the results were not as satisfactory as Korean
landscapes. I always felt relieved when seeing nature. So I wanted to landscapes in oils. When seeing pictures colored after printing the
express this state and emotion. I painted landscapes in watercolor contour on a copperplate at an antique shop I called in by chance, I
during my middle school days and landscapes mainly in oils during my felt European scenes could be more effectively expressed in this way.
high school days. When studying at art college, I worked on abstract However, the problems were time required for learning copperplate
paintings in oil, acrylic, or watercolor and painted pictures based on print and lots of equipment need for printing like a pressing machine.
folk paintings, but this was less satisfactory than painting landscapes. Thus, what I had conceived was light-colored pen painting technique
After graduation, I did many landscape paintings, but these didn’t that applies watercolor after drawing the details of an object and its
always meet my satisfaction. I decided I had to paint landscapes in ink outlines with a pen point. The printing technique of adding colors after
wash painting after seeing by chance ink wash landscape paintings printing outlines in a copperplate print or a woodcut was used to insert
displayed at an exhibition. So I studied ink wash painting in graduate a number of color pictures into a book in the East and the West before
school and have worked with ink wash painting since. color printing technique developed.

Nature has long been respected in the East since ancient times. That The styles of paintings are classed by the difference of materials or
is, nature is not an object of conquest or subjugation but something techniques. That is, the same technique looks different if the style
for humans to adapt themselves to and coexist with. Ink wash painting changes. Just as the same clothes feels completely different by the way
started in China and influenced painting in Korea, but it stayed at the one wears them, light-colored pen painting is different depending of
level of imitating Chinese ink wash painting before Jeong Seon in the the mode of expression.
Joseon Dynasty period. From the time of Jeong Seon, painters began
painting true-view landscapes, going through the Renaissance of King I have primarily painted European scenes, but Korean ancient palaces
Yeongjo and King Jeongjo and a number of painters left a large body are as beautiful as old European buildings. It seems that Korean
of masterpieces in a style different from that of Chinese painting. All painters have frequently painted landscapes but rarely painted palaces.
the same, this style receded due to Prince Gung’s encouragement of The painters often cannot capture beauty close to them easily. The
Sinocentrism in late Joseon Korea and it turned into that of Chinese reason why I illustrated details in light-colored pen painting is to look
painting highlighting both painting’s meaning and the painter’s spirit. into this beauty more minutely. On a close view of the palace I usually
Later, artistic activity was deterred because of the Japanese invasion passed by indifferently, I realized our ancestors’ aesthetic sense is
and the Korean War for quite a time, but painters like Lee Sang- amazing.
beom and Byun Kwan-sik kept its tradition alive with their ink wash
paintings of Korean nature including its mountains and streams. With We have to examine the artist’s intentions in terms of painting, be it
the influence of Western art that was introduced after the war, this ink wash painting or light-colored pen painting. As painting is one of
style was rarely executed, but it was enlivened in the 1980s with the the visual arts, we have to commune and interact with artworks rather
1980s ink wash painting movement. And yet, it was mired in recession than calling for any lengthy account. Although ‘be Korean’ cannot be
again in the 2000s. As a diversity of art genres using various mediums defined in a single word, I represent Korean sensibility with Korean
entered the country depending on the current of the times, ink wash landscapes in ink wash painting and light-colored pen painting. From
painting was deemed a classical genre. For example, more art school now on, all evaluations are up to viewers and appreciators.
applicants intend to study design or video art than the fine arts.

The modernization of ink wash painting was the topic raised in the
1980s ink wash painting movement. This notion cannot be defined in