Bahc Yiso, Your Bright Future, 2002, Electric lamps, woods and wires, MMCA collection
Bahc Yiso
* Source: MMCA
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Hyunsil Publishing
Hyunsil Publishing was a publishing company founded in 1992 by an art community group interested in art and social movements. When the progressive art movement group, the Research Society for Art Criticism (Misul bipyung yeonguhoe) (1989-1993), became inactive in 1992, Kim Suki, Kim Jinsong, and Um Hyuk, who led the art movement together, created Hyeonsil Munhwa Yeongu. Instead of discussing abstract discourse or high culture, they focused on various phenomena in popular culture and daily life. A series of books published by Hyunsil contained the major discourses and issues of the cultural community in 1990s South Korea. Representative books include Apgujeong-dong Utopia Dystopia (1992) written by Yun Suknam, Kim Jinsong, Kim Suki, Eom Hyeok, Park Youngsook, and Cho Bongjin, Watching TV Close, Reading TV from Distance, The Myth, Desire, Image of Advertisement, Do as You Please, and New Generation Theory: Order and Chaos in 1993. In the 2000s, Hyeonsil Munhwa Yeongu has essentially become more of a publishing company specializing in culture than an art collective.
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Research Society for Art Criticism
The Research Society for Art Criticism (Misul bipyung yeonguhoe) was founded by several critics interested in the field of progressive realism, such as Lee Youngwook, Shim Kwanghyun, and Lee Youngchul in 1989. The group aimed to develop the theoretical grounding for a new Korean nationalist art movement and methodology applicable to the rapidly changing social and cultural environment in Korea. They focused on Korean modern art, critical theory, cultural theory, and mass media theory. By providing theoretical support for Minjung art, the group played a significant role in the mainstream emergence of socially critical art in Korea. Major members of the society included Sung Wan-kyung, Lee Youngwook, Shim Kwanghyun, Lee Youngchul, Park Sinui, Eom Hyeok, Park Chan-kyong, Beck Jee-sook, Lee Youngjun, Kim Suki, Kim Jinsong, Kang Sungwon, Paik Han-ul, Oh Museok, Lee Yunam, Cho Bongjin, Choi Bum, Cho In-su, Gal Hong, Yang Hyunmi, Kim Yongcheol, and Lee Juyeong. The group was disbanded in July 1993.
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Postmodernism
Postmodernism emerged to prominence in the 1980s as a broad intellectual critique of modernism in its role as the dominant philosophical zeitgeist of the 20th century. Postmodernist critique has a general tendency to challenge the separation between high and low culture, strict distinctions between artistic genres, as well as notions of originality, newness, and authorship. The term postmodernist art can be used to cover a wide range of creative approaches, none of which are limited to medium-specificity, however, appropriation and citation are often considered as important characteristics. In art history, the label can be applied to many artworks created after the 1960s; however, it is not used for one specific genre of art. The term can be applied to not only pop art in its resisting of cultural hierarchies and conceptual art deviating from medium-specificity, but also land art, body art, video art, and installation art in terms of their critically expanding of artistic genre and form in challenge to established convention. In the context of the 1980s, Neo-expressionist paintings, returning back to figuration and historical eclecticism (such as Julian Schnabel’s works), and the ironically “staged” self-portrait photographs of Cindy Sherman question the originality and provide evidence of the variety of artistic practices that could be termed as postmodernist art. As such, the term postmodernism, can perhaps most usefully be considered in application to the diverse types of artistic practices that challenge the conventional notions of modernism. In Korea, postmodernist works offer an equally diverse field of practice depending on the definition of “postmodernism” in question. Historically, the term was used to describe the work of the small art groups called “New generation” that emerged between the end of the 1980s and early 1990s. These groups often focused their work on de-centered topics, usage of multi-media, an affinity with popular culture, and a casual attitude towards fine art. Some people also regard the Minjung Art movement as representative of postmodernism in Korea. This is because it emerged as a direct criticism against national modernist art including Dansaekhwa of the 1970s.
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Minjung Art
An artistic movement that came to prominence alongside Korea’s democratization movement in the 1980s. Minjung artists often sought to critically portray the violent repression and corruption of the military dictatorship, to represent the experiences of laborers and farmers, and to achieve social change through art. In contrast to abstraction, which constituted the mainstream of 1970s art in Korea, Minjung Art is notable for the use of representational and figurative forms. One possible point of origin for Minjung Art is Oh Yoon’s work in the Reality Group (Hyeonsil dongin). The group was formed in 1969 by Kim Ji-ha, Oh Yoon, and Lim Se-taek. A variety of Minjung art groups were established, including the Reality and Utterance (Hyunsilgwa bareon) in 1979 by Kim Jungheun, Oh Yoon, Joo Jae-hwan, art critic Sung Wan-kyung, and Choi Min, the Gwangju Freedom Artist Association (Gwangju jayu misulin hyeopuihoe) in 1979 by Hong Sungdam and Choi Youl, the Imsulnyeon (The Year Imsul) in 1982, and the Dureong in 1983. These groups all commonly critiqued Western capitalism. In terms of form, Minjung artists adopted traditional and ethnic folk modes of expression using diverse media such as collage, printmaking, oil painting, and photography. Following the 15 Years of Korean Minjoong Arts: 1980-1994 Exhibition at the National Museum of Modern and Contemporary Art, Minjung Art became an accepted part of Korean art history. Overseas, Minjung Art has also become a recognized term that describes this genre and its unique focus on the political and social history of Korea.
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Post-Minjung art
A Korean artistic movement characterized by participation, which emerged following the decline of Minjung Art in the 1980s. The term and concept were particularly discussed in light of the attempts toward a critical restoration of Minjung Art during the late 1990s. Notable examples of the exponents of this concern include; Art groups such as the Seongnam Project, flyingCity, and Mixrice; and artists such as Park Chan-kyong, Cho Seub, Koh Seungwook, and Lim Minouk. These Post-Minjung artists criticized the theory-based reconstruction of political meaning within artistic production, use of class-based perspectives, and the Modernist anti-dialectic abandonment that characterized Minjung art. The movement adopted the pluralist rhetoric of the Western art community that was developed after the 1960s concerning conceptual art, site-specificity and institutional critique, identity politics, and installation practice. Post-Minjung artists also speculated on the use of new modes of realism that responded to the changed social, political, and economic conditions of Korea after the 1990s. Due to the influence of these artists, there has been substantial debate on whether all participatory art in 21st century Korea should be directly linked to the tradition of Minjung Art.
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Venice Biennale Korean Pavilion
The Venice Biennale is an international art festival that began in 1895, and the Korean Pavilion opened in 1995 as the 26th national pavilion. The establishment of the Korean Pavilion was the result of government-level support, corporate donations, and the activism of artists after Paik Nam June’s work was exhibited in the German Pavilion and won the Golden Lion Award. The Pavilion was allocated space in Castello between the German and Japanese Pavilions. It was built primarily of glass and metal and based on the design of architect Kim Seokchul.
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