| Title | Korean brush strokes-Yoon Jin-seop (Art critic) | |
|---|---|---|
| Link | ||
|
We are the age owned by today New awareness of Korean painting and roles of the Woman’s Association of Korean Painting Opening the exhibition of “Korean brush strokes” Yoon Jin-seop (Art critic) The Woman’s Association of Korean Painting, the gathering of female artists as majors of Korean painting holds the ninth regular exhibiton under the theme of “Korean brush strokes.” This Association established the tradition of holding thematic exhibitions and not mere membership exhibitions by setting up a specific annual theme at every regular exhibition. For your information, the theme of the seventh exhibition of 2006 was “Yesterday and today of Seoul” and the theme of the eighth exhibition of last year was “Dream of Zhuangzi.” This year’s theme is “Korea’s brush strokes” as mentioned above.
As I see it, the intention of this Association holding an annual membership exhibition under the new theme must be in letting the members know of the importance of exhibition by avoiding the stereotyped annual event. In the middle of reality where there are not a few large-scale associations with more than one hundred members, it will be challenging to secure clear identity of the Association and highlight its existence. For this reason, most of institutions and art associations prepare a variety of programs to achieve differentiation from other institutions. The same happens with the Woman’s Association of Korean Painting in this aspect. At present, there are several groups established by artists as majors of Korean painting, but this Association carries out the most distinct activities in terms of scale and amount of members among associations established by female artists from different universities.
In front of the theme entitled “Korean brush strokes,” we must pay attention to the reason of adding the expression “Korean” in it. This does not seem irrelevant to the fact that this Association is a gathering of female artists who majored in Korean painting. It is because only Korean painting tends to emphasize cultural identity based on artistic purity while the so-called phenomenon of fusion is widely spread in most arts since postmodernism. This is against scientific tendency of “consilience,” the recent movement in both humanities and science area. Research results of independent disciplines have difficulty of complete explanation of the complex world such as the universe and life, and this need gave rise to scientific methodology called “consilience.” The same way, it will be necessary that art also should go beyond extreme purity and create a new cultural horizon from more macroscopic discernment.
Therefore, the meaning of “Korean” in this title of exhibition, as mentioned above, is more similar to macroscopic position intending to create universal aesthetic values getting abreast of the world art than the narrow-minded position of artistic purity. With closed-minded artist consciousness or narrow world awareness, this goal is difficult to attain.
It is because the ambiguous values of particular and universal aspects connoted by the theme “Korean brush strokes” mean that brush strokes must reach beyond brush strokes with Korean characteristics, and it is important to have brush strokes as a universal aspect based on the understanding of the world at the same time.
For the purpose of this, above all, it will be crucial to make a sober analysis of status quo. It is because members will have to not only have acute recognition of situation regarding constantly changing surrounding conditions and cultural fluctuations, but also carry out cultural practices through brush strokes. Today, unilateral cultural acceptance by the Western powers over one hundred years start to manifest the indications of reversal due to the emergence of powerful Asian empire formed in recent years. Cultural strategy of Asia, which will develop in the future, will move towards the direction of balance of culture and art between the West and the East through manifestation of aesthetic values of Asia. Considering this, it will be indispensable that “Korean brush strokes” should develop not only principle of beauty implied inside but also diverse methodologies as the practical alternatives. This is based upon the premise of broad experiment in that we need to establish the canvas imbued with modern life emotions and color sense by improving strict traditional laws and accept new media or introduce modern materials.
Korean painting owns limitation by nature compared to other genres. It seems that this limitation is already included in the title of “Korean painting.” The connotation of this term “Korean” seems to be nearer to the closed aspect than to the open aspect when hearing Korean subject, Korean materials and Korean form and the like. Members of the the Woman’s Association of Korean Painting are responsible for moving forward by destroying the fence and changing the negative connotation into positive ones.
|