Exhibition showcases Korean paintings

Korean Contemporary Spectrum showcases 150 paintings of Korean artists, tracing their path of traditional, contemporary and calligraphic arts as a part of an international cultural exchange. It aims to extend the visual language of the present-day art forms in relevance to realism, creating the illusion of depth and space. Visual excitement is the starting point of an art that involves poeticism. An art piece turns to an abstract when an artist is not able to express his desired feeling in a literal sense. It is the intimacy of the subject matter that makes one understand more about the little-touched concepts. It is said that the artists’ compositions are either tough to understand or interpret. But no such difficulty is found here in deciphering what a painting actually denotes. Starting from acrylics on canvas to oil depictions, these paintings convey the modern understanding of art with clarity. Each element including colour, tone, placement, composition and brush mark are equally present in art pieces that adds ambience to the onlookers. One of the paintings, Hope, is about the complex relationship between reality and illusion, inviting self-reassessment and reflection. Kim Jong Hyun’s landscape of road crossing has multitextured scenes with a twist. Mixed media seems to interest the Korean artists, who have explored the endless realms of possibilities and meanings.Won Soon Ok’s Whisper of life has a compelling sense of immediacy and intensity. She mainly shows the background with lesser emphasis to human figures. Having linked certain working process with philosophy of ideas, a particular source of inspiration and motivation is seen in her work. Kim Sung Ok’s Embedded purity is appealing with a tinge of lightness that’s born out of passages of untouched white space. Transparency neutralises the effects of colours in which the shell is being covered with web cobs. Lee Jon Lip’s oil work, Garden spring, shows that same colours can offer different perspectives depending on other hues that are placed next. Shin Dong Sook’s Emotion shares the engagement and involvement from the artist’s direct observation; it evokes realism. Park Won Kyoung’s untitled piece has implications in terms of making shapes that form meddling lines with colours. Seo Gi Hwan’s Human landscape creates one’s own dramatic visions, considering how you might situate a powerful angle and then decide what is to be and what is not to be included. Kong Tae Yun’s mini toys on canvas show Japan’s industrial efficiency in car production. The closed and packed colourful toy cars puzzle the viewers at the first sight. When one constantly looks at this, it would form a focused pattern according to his levels of imagination and creativity. Kim Han O’s Into the time portrays the sensual quality of colours that crosses all the disciplines of art, science and literature. Ryoo Myeong Ryeol’s Pine tree has shown the way of light that defines the subject and brings self-definitions to the objects. Park Kwang Ho’s First snow is as fresh as a moisture drop that illustrates heavy whiteout that draws in an apt mood of joy. Kang Hun Gu’s Space talks about the colour patches on canvas that vastly differs in the aspects of the adjacent colours. As one delves deep into the art work, he can realise that the usage of colours is even more personal. The other works —Wind-bell, Nostalgia, Pot story, Natural sensitivity, Nude, Natural cult, Beyond prejudice, Human, Inexistent place, Walking on mountain, Interval, Gate of December, Who are U, Jar, Between, Memory from complex, Violin, Co-existence, Don’t walk 2, Life, Spirit, Mud flat, External relation and Understanding myself, enhance a unique aesthetic sense of approach that leaves one in awe to feel that art is not just a mere representation of subjective objects, but an outbursts of unnamed emotions.(The exhibition is on till August 4 at Lalit Kala Akademy, Anna Salai. For details, call InKo Centre, 23261224)