The Hampyeong County Museum of Art in Gwangju is hosting "The Master's Eyes", an exhibition of works by 63 leading artists who have distinguished themselves in Modern and Contemporary Korean art such as Chae Yong-Shin, Kim Ki-Chang, Park Soo-Geun, Lee Jung-Seop, Jang Wook-Jin, Lee Eung-No, Chun Kyung-Ja, Kim Whan-Ki, Kwon Jin-Kyu, Park Seo-Bo, and Kim Chang-Yeol. The exhibition explores the history, changes, and artistic achievements of Korean art over the past 100 years and is organized around four themes: "Inheritance," "Acceptance," "Innovation," and "Self-Reliance".
Art Museum SoL is currently hosting K-Museum's touring exhibition "A Day in the Life of a Scholar" which will make a total of 88 stops before its final closing date in November. The show aims to revive popular interest and appreciation for the scholarly way of life centered around concepts like 'slowness,' 'reflection,' and 'dignified living' and to juxtapose this to the flashy visualism of Western culture.
Kwon Soon-Kwan's solo exhibition "Polyhedral Masses" is on view at Maehyang-ri Peace Memorial, formerly a shooting range for the U.S. military. The exhibition space is designed after religious altars and the structure of the Monstrance and aims to represent history in visual/mechanical form. Secular violence and religious sublimation meet in a "laboratory of aesthetics". This is one of many war-themed exhibitions in recent months.
Four artists - Choi Young-Wook, Kang Min-Soo, Kang Jun-Young, Kim Hyun-Joo - present the exhibition "Capture/Store/Hold" exploring the traces of time, memory, and life through different materials and visual languages. The shape on focus is the moon jar - a timeless symbol of Joson aesthetics and Eastern spirituality. Choi Young-Wook focuses on cracks as a symbol of the formation and dissolution of relationships. Kang Min-Soo crafts white porcelain moon jars using the traditional method of Yanggu (white clay and wood firing). Artist Kang Jun-Young stacks colors and words to tell family histories, memories and relationships. Kim Hyun-Joo applies the traditional mother-of-pearl cutting technique onto "modern and shiny" metal.
Shin Kwang-Ho's "21st Wreckage" explores "sentimental thinking", sensation and narrative and the formation of understanding on the basis of signals. The artist captures the moment before meaning is organized when senses and thought diverge and freezes that moment on the canvas. His focus is the process of weaving emotions and thoughts into a coherent narrative; the movement towards a single, linear meaning.
Park No-Shik's solo exhibition "Primary Effect" explores the gap between "the self seen by others" and the "me as perceived by myself" and the overall topic of self-image formation. Repeatedly facing another "me" created by others, influences me how? My perception of them, influences them how? How is our opinion of other people formed, on the basis of what information and impressions?
Park Yong-Il's "Nothing Happened Today" explores the harsh and dark reality of ordinary people in Goyang who lost their homes under the logic of the "development" policy of the 90s. Desolate landscapes, lost homes, economic uncertainty, the sense of rootlessness, loss and sorrow - are all on focus in his works. He uses the "bundle" (bojagi wrap) as his own metaphor for all of these. Traditionally, bojagi is a cloth patchwork used for wrapping household items and clothes when changing homes or moving. It is one of the key symbols to represent the mass movement of people which ensued in Korea after the War and during the 70s modernisation plan. The exhibition aims to confirm the narrative power of contemporary painting.
Dongdok Gallery is hosting "From Carving to Printing", a commemorative exhibition for the 40th anniversary of artist Oh Yoon's passing. The show will feature 187 prints by the artist and his family and will be the last opportunity for collectors to purchase works by the artist before the family discontinues sales. Oh Yoon is one of the leading artists of the 80s whose prints depict the life of ordinary people during the turbulent 1980s when the country was transitioning to democracy.
Pohang Museum of Steel Art is hosting "Re: Figure: Transforming Forms, Expanding Sculpture", a group exhibition by five artists working with steel as a medium of expression. They examine the shaping and reshaping of metal and how this process transforms its properties and uses.
On a similar note, Gallery Joeun is showing Kwon Yong-Rae's solo exhibition "Becoming" in which the artist explores the relationship between light (and its consequence - color) and metal. The artist hammers the flat surface of laser-cut metal units to create subtle bends and then coats them with pigment. For the artist, light is not an external condition illuminating the work but a sculptural element that completes it. The exhibition features 16 works which cross the boundaries of painting, sculpture, and installation.