A letter to Bartomeu Mari

By Kate Lim

You stated in your interview conducted in March that the museum would provide support in connecting the past of Korean art to its present, as contemporary Korean art still has a weak narrative. This is a perfectly valid point. Your comment on the lack of a narrative of Korean art that impedes its truly global presence, I hope, should rightfully generate passionate discussion among the art professionals of Korea. I feel that we both share a concern in building a genuine art narrative for Korea, though unfortunately the majority of the art world does not. Then, you remarked in another interview in May that both the context and narrative structure of contemporary Korean art would become clear if we connected the 1970s’ Dansaekhwa to Western Minimalism of the 1950s and 60s, and the 1980s’ Minjoong art to the political Pop art that emerged worldwide during the 1970s. You ultimately suggested that the formulation of the narrative of Korean art could be done through one-to-one comparisons between Korean art and the Western precedent.

But I have to disagree. Making a one-to-one comparison hardly helps in narrative-building. That is nothing new and you merely repeat what has been done for the last several decades by the majority of critics both at home and abroad. Let’s take Dansaekhwa, for example. It was so common to graft the discourse of Dansaekhwaon to that of Minimalism, so that countless Korean works of literature tirelessly references Judd & other Minimalists. Pages and pages of curatorial and art critical essays never fail to swear unswerving fealty to Minimalism, claiming to put Dansaekwha in the so-called ‘global context.’ But, however hard critics tried, there was always an uncomfortable truth left unexplained: the substantial difference between Dansaekhwa and Minimalism. So, at the end of such commentaries ―lavishly backed up by lengthy and overused explanations of Minimalism ― there appeared the pathetic phrase: “Dansaekwha: the Korean Minimalism” with an invisible accent on the word ‘Korean.’ Just as you intend to do, they connected Dansaekhwa to Minimalism. So arrived the story of Dansaekhwa within the global chapter of Minimalism. Its title becomes ‘Korean Leg of Minimalism,’ completed with a quibbler’s footnote justifying that this Leg of Minimalism is indeed and truly Korean: “this art form of Korea is very unique because item bodies the spirit of “soenbi” of the Joseon Kingdom or self-discipline or meditation or whatever those traditional, cultural traits were in the past of Korea.” The thousands of catalogue essays stashed in the museum are saturated with this kind of narrative. You don’t have to start that all over again.

This kind of comparison is fundamentally wrong for two reasons. Firstly, Dansaekhwa is not Minimalism. Dansaekhwa emerged as a tangible art tendency from the early 1970s, and by that time, Minimalism was already a given fact to the Korean artists. To be more accurate, Minimalism was already passed on to the artists as a ‘theory.’ If the artist’s work perfectly fit into the category of Minimalism, she or he was surely a mere imitator, not a genuine creator. Dansaekhwa is not a photograph of Minimalism. Secondly, (this is a quite common fallacy shared among contemporary critics) you have a preconception of the way the art is presented and understood in a ‘global context.’ Your idea of ‘global context’ is American and European-centered, and it leads you to assume that there is one single narrative structure of art in the world to be used for all contexts. The truth is that there are many different narratives of art and the global context is not composed of a sole engine but of interactions of diverse narratives of art all over the world. True to your professional title as a cultivated, globe-trotting curator-cum-head of the museum, you had better abandon your assumptions and go into the heart of Korean artist’s real practice, their working methods, their processes of reflection on the world and on art.

In fact, to place Korean art in the context of the Western precedent and explaining it in absolute connection with Western practices is hindering the building of a narrative for Korean art. Critics end up perpetually evading the explanation of the glaringly substantial characteristics of Korean art, how that particular diversity of Korea was formulated and on what ground that particular art of Korea contributed to the dynamic composite of actual global art. What is equally tragic is that when artists rise to fame on the international art scene, the local art commentators unthinkingly accept the ‘global’ context of art provided by Western commentaries and insert the names of these artists and art in the existing and very scattered discourse. The question “Why is their work so important?” is never critically discussed when it is, without a doubt, quintessential for building the narrative of Korean art.

Finally, you mentioned that you were planning to open an exhibition featuring calligraphy and ceramics in 2017/2018. I understand that the show will reflect your curatorial intentions to capture and show viewers a consistent link between artworks of the past and present. I am also concerned about the positioning of the past of Korean art in the narrative of contemporary Korean art. During the development of contemporary Korean art, there has been a periodical resurgence of the art of the past, used or mobilized as a strategic means to revive the link across the times. But, I often wonder if this reinstatement of the past art forms in their various materials or styles can really explain how the past is alive in the present context in a convincing way. As I said earlier, explaining Dansaekhwa by referencing the past and its cultural patina colors the Dansaekhwa artist as a member of a retro-cult ‘untainted’ by the corruption or failure of modern civilization. Dansaekhwa artists, in their 30s and 40s, never subscribed to a simplistic restoration of the past. They were extremely contemporary, and were focusing on the perception of the ‘now’ during their times.

For this reason, I am full of curiosity about the new show that you will be supervising. I would appreciate it if you could keep my observations in mind. As the director of the National Museum of Modern and Contemporary Art Korea you have a consecrate authority that art lovers of Korea entrust in you.

Kate Lim is director of Art Platform Asia, an independent curator and art writer. Contact her at kate.yk.lim@gmail.com.