More than a historical survey, “The Making of Modern Korean Art” is a reminder that modernism was not merely an aesthetic—it was a shared way of living formed through correspondence and mutual exchange. Organized in tandem with the launch of a landmark English-language publication of the same title, this scholarly, archive-driven exhibition brings to light the unpublished letters of four key figures in postwar Korean art: Kim Whanki, Kim Tschang-Yeul, Lee Ufan, and Park Seo-Bo. Spanning over two decades, the letters chart the intellectual, emotional, and geopolitical currents that shaped the emergence of Korean modernism.
Displayed alongside seminal early works—including Park’s Ecriture No. 65-75 (1975), Kim Tschang-Yeul’s Waterdrops (1975), Lee Ufan’s From Line (1977), and Kim Whanki’s transcendent dot painting from his New York period (1971)—the letters function not as context, but as parallel material: intimate, ideologically vibrant, and often profoundly vulnerable. They oscillate between practical logistics and philosophical musings, and reveal a shared urgency to define a modern Korean art distinct from Western paradigms and the cultural authority of established norms and traditions.
A standout example is a 1973 letter from Kim Whanki to Kim Tschang-Yeul that offers a poetic reflection on the “Waterdrop” series: “It looks like drops of perspiration, not water. You worked on it so hard. … [It would be] good as a great desert, a broad plain; the more fervent the inspiration, the more earnest it seems.” The letter reveals how artistic labor was both observed and deeply felt between peers—modernism here emerges as an intimate dialogue shaped by mutual care, critique, and emotional investment.
This communal spirit could also be felt during a panel this past May at Asia Society, where a group of people associated with the book—co-editors Yeon Shim Chung and Doryun Chong, contributor Kyung An, and Lee himself—reflected on the project’s long gestation. Lee spoke candidly about the need to resist absorption into Western-centric narratives. Their correspondence, as the exhibition reveals, was a lifeline—a form of mutual recognition and radical endurance.
At Tina Kim Gallery, 525 West 21st Street, through June 21.
