By Kim Heung-sook
Spring is a season for the eyes. Both people and Mother Nature are busy revealing what they have secretly prepared during the dreary winter. The mulberry tree is budding with tiny leaves wrinkled like the hands of a newborn baby. Lilac branches are punctuated by tiny buds, and the jasmine is doing even better with the thick new leaves already prevailing over the pale leftovers from last year.
Human efforts cannot be better showcased than at galleries in the Insa-dong, Sagan-dong and Cheongdam-dong neighborhoods in Seoul. On Wednesdays and Thursdays, crates of artworks are unloaded from container trucks that crowd not only the main streets but also the small alleys in the artistic clusters.
While small galleries in Insa-dong offer a dynamic variety of rising artists and their free-spirited, sharp-witted experiments with media and techniques, acclaimed works by famous artists command such larger spaces as the National Museum of Contemporary Art, Seoul Museum of Art and Deoksu-gung Museum.
A Van Gogh exhibition featuring 67 works by the world-renowned Dutch artist is closing tomorrow at Seoul Museum of Art. It has been here for nearly three months, but I still hope it will stay on for more. Gogh's paintings can serve the Korean public well in the springtime as they did superbly during the winter when there wasn't much to see except the gray cold.
At Deoksu-gung Museum inside Deoksu-gung Palace, another meaningful exhibition will be coming to an end on March 30. There are 120 works by Korean artist Choe Young-rim and his Japanese teacher-friend Shiko Munakata, which offer the viewer an interesting yet thought-provoking experience of comparing two great artists at one place. Outside, in the precincts of the Joseon Dynasty palace, spring sprouts through the softening ground.
Whether one strolls around the budding plants or artworks, his or her worst enemy is among the fellow spectators. ``Look at that! The cute little points on the trees! I wish I had the trees at my home!" ``Oh, I love Van Gogh. I love the 'Irises.' I wish I had the 'Glass of Absinthe and a Carafe' on the wall of my dining room!"
When I hear such exclamations, I wish I could shut their mouths. While their excitement is understandable, the bigmouths are disturbing to others and their appreciation of the beautiful objects and scenery, like red underlines in a borrowed book.
There were times when high-handed critics played God over artists in Korea as William Nasmyth does in Iain Pears's ``The Portrait." Read a few lines and you will see how the critics batter the artists: ``... an incredulity followed by a rising desire to turn away… The battle to remain detached, unconcerned… The mounting panic as the words flow over you… The terrible fear that what you are reading is the truth, not merely the opinion of one biased, malevolent man… And then, the hatred. The blind but utterly impotent loathing of the man who has done this… Finally, the belief… that the words are true… They gnaw at you, those words, bring you to the brink of madness, because you cannot shake them out of your mind…"
These days, such an absolute power of a critic is hard to witness at least in Korea. On the contrary, art critics, most of them professors, seem eager to please the artists, sometimes providing their low-quality pieces with unfitting or near-lie praises. The good thing is that they usually express their views in catalogs and they can't disturb you unless you pick them up and read.
The headache, therefore, comes mostly from the lay viewers. In the past, laymen didn't think loud in galleries, but they speak out unrestrainedly these days. The ever-expanding Internet has enhanced the freedom of expression and everyone talks about anything even when they only know little about it. It's good to have democracy in action, but one's freedom shouldn't lead to others' frustration.
So, go out to where spring is burgeoning and enjoy the scenery, but don't say a word. Keep your thoughts to yourself for some time before they bloom into something beautiful as winter did to bring forth spring.