“Culture News: Founding of the 1950 Art Association,” Yonhap Shinmun, January 10, 1950, 4, column 10
1950 Art Association
* Source: Multilingual Glossary of Korean Art by Korea Arts Management Service
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Nam Kwan
Nam Kwan (1911-1990) graduated from the Taiheiyo Art School in 1935 and performed research for two further years. He submitted his work to the Ministry of Education Fine Arts Exhibition (Munbuseong misul jeollamhoe), Donggwang Group Exhibition, and the Gukhwa Group Exhibition in Tokyo. In 1954, he attended the Académie de la Grande Chaumièrec in Paris and was invited to submit his work to the Avant-Garde Art Exhibition Salon de Mai and Fleuve Art Gallery. After returning to Korea in 1968, he became a professor at Hongik University. Before he went to Paris, he created portrait and landscape paintings, emphasizing lyrical colors and free expression. While Nam Kwan’s early works tended to focus on figuration, he switched to Oriental style of abstraction, influenced by Parisian Art Informel. In 1962, he experimented with abstract works symbolizing ancient letter inscriptions and after his return to Korea in 1968 he developed a style based on mask abstraction. He liked to utilize abstract letters, lines, and figures using blue as an organising palette. Nam Kwan became a leading figure in the abstract art movement in Korea after independence, and he is particularly well-known for reconfiguring ancient inscriptions as abstract idioms within his work.
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Kim Whanki
Kim Whanki (1913-1974, pen name Suhwa) was born in Sinan, Jeollanamdo, and his family origin was from Gimhae. He studied at the Department of Fine Arts at Nihon University, Tokyo, Japan from 1933 to 1936. He joined the Avant-Garde Western Art Institute in 1934 and submitted his work to Avant-Garde art associations, such as the Second Division Exhibition Nikaten (Nika Art Exhibition) and the Exhibition of the Free Artists Association (Jiyu Bijutsuka Kyokai). After independence, he organized the New Realism Group and worked as a professor in the Department of Fine Art at Seoul National University (1946-1950) and Hongik University (1952-55). He lived in Paris from 1956 to 1959, and after his return, he became a professor and later the Dean of the Fine Art College at Hongik University (1959-1963). He participated in the seventh Sao Paulo Biennale and won an honorary award, and then moved to New York. He abruptly passed away while having a solo exhibition at Poindexter Gallery, New York, ironically when his career in the US was at its peak. As a pioneer of Korean abstract art, he started by working in geometric abstraction and moved on to semi-abstract work that featured natural motifs such as the mountain, the moon, and the river. After moving to the U.S., he returned to abstraction with his so-called "dot paintings." His painting 16-Ⅳ-70 #166 Where, in What Form, Shall We Meet Again? (1970), was awarded a grand prize at the Korean Art Grand Award Exhibition and has inspired many contemporary Korean artists. His work Rondo (1938) was selected as No. 535 within the national Registered Cultural Properties.
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Lee Qoede
Lee Qoede (1913-1965) was born in Chilgok, Gyeongsangnam-do as the second son of a wealthy landowner family. He was strongly influenced and supported by his brother, leftist intellectual Lee Yeoseong and specialized in the history of art, clothing, and folklore. He graduated from Soochang Elementary School in Daegu in 1928, Whimoon High School in 1933, and the Department of Western Painting at the Teikoku Art School in Japan. His works, such as Fate (1938), Night Picnic (1939), and Swing (1940), were selected for the Nikakai Exhibition. After his return to Korea, he founded and led the New Artists Association and its exhibitions from 1941 to 1944. After independence, he was appointed as a committee member of the painting division at the Korean Plastic Arts Federation [Joseon johyeong yesul dongmaeng] and a chairman of the Western Painting division at the Korean Art Alliance [Joseon misul dongmaeng]. After visiting North Korea, he became a centrist and founded the Korean Art and Culture Association [Joseon misul munhwa hyeophoe]. where he was appointed as a chair. In 1948, he joined the National Guidance League. While working as a lecturer at Hongik University, the Korean war broke out, after then and he contributed to the Korean Art Alliance. He escaped Seoul just prior to the 1950 September operation to retake the city but was arrested by the South Korean army and held in prison camps in Busan and Geoje. In an exchange of prisoners, he opted to go to North Korea. In 1988, when the ban on artists who defected to North Korea was lifted, his family revealed his works, such as the People series, A Beggar, and Fate, to the public. He then was re-evaluated as one of the most significant artists in Korean modern art history.
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Great Korean Art Association
An art association that formed in 1948, when the Korean Art Association [Joseon misul hyeophoe], which was established in 1945, reformed in parallel with the establishment of the new Korean government. Following independence, the organization reformed and expanded primarily to foster solidarity and anti-communist sentiment in artists, and held the inaugural Great Korean Art Association Exhibition. In June 1961, the association closed officially with the government's comprehensive art institute reformation policy, and in December that year, the association merged into the Korean Fine Arts Association [Hanguk misul hyeopoe].
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Kim Byungki
Kim Byungki (1916-2022) was one of the first-generation Korean abstract artists. He was born in Pyongyang as the second son of Kim Chanyoung, who graduated from the Tokyo School of Fine Arts. He associated with Kim Whanki at the Avant-garde Western Art Institute in Tokyo in 1933, and in 1939 he studied at the Art Department of Bunka School in Tokyo together with Lee Jungseop and Mun Haksu. After his return to Korea, he served as a secretary of the Korean Art Alliance (Joseon misul dongmaeng) in Pyongyang and then moved to Seoul in 1948. Kim Byungki established the 1950 Art Association (Osimnyeon misul hyeophoe) under the Korean Culture Research Institute in 1949 and, as its secretary-general, tried to unite established artists, but due to the outbreak of the Korean War, it never held exhibitions. During the war, he worked as a deputy director of the military painter group. In 1954, he participated in the Special Exhibition on Modern Korean Painting at the National Museum. After reading an article in The Times related to Pablo Picasso’s painting Massacre in Korea (1951), Kim published “Farewell to Picasso” in the first issue of Munhak yesul (Literature and Art) in 1954. He also devoted himself to art practice, art education, and art theory by teaching at Seoul National University, Seoul Arts High School, and the Institute of Contemporary Art and participating in the first Contemporary Art Exhibit hosted by the Chosun Ilbo newspaper company. He was commissioner of the Paris Biennale in 1961. In 1965, as the board president of Korean Fine Arts Association, he worked as commissioner and judge of the São Paulo Biennale. At the time, he moved to the U.S. and settled in Saratoga, New York, where he absorbed himself in creating artworks for twenty years until he returned home. In 1986, he held a solo exhibition at the Gana Gallery in Seoul. In 1989 he returned to the U.S. and Kim returned to South Korea permanently in 2014 for the MMCA’s exhibition Kim Byungki: The Distribution of Sensible. In 2022, he passed away at the age of 106. Among his notable works are Street Trees (1947), Still Life by Window (1954), Mountain (1967), Forest and Still Life (1987), and Winter Scene (2000).
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