Expositions en cours
The life and art of Goam Lee Ungno are deeply intertwined with the turbulent history of 20th-century Korea. He began his artistic journey within the tradition of literati painting from the Joseon era but sought change after encountering Western modernism in Japan. Among the new art that Lee Ungno came into contact with there was abstrat art, he reinterpreted and recontextualized it within the framework of East Asian tradition. Lee Ungno's interpretation of 'abstraction' can be understood through his evolving artistic language, expressed as 'semi-abstraction,' 'ideational abstraction,' and 'calligraphic abstraction,' each corresponding to different periods. To summarize Lee Ungno's abstraction in one sentence, it can be described as a redefinition of the traditional East Asian aesthetic theory of "the unity of calligraphy and painting"—the idea that calligraphy and painting stem from the same root—within the framework of Western abstraction. Therefore, calligraphy and writing are central to Lee's abstraction. The 2025 permanent exhibition at the Lee Ungno Museum, "Abstraction Woven with Letters," traces his journey of abstraction with a focus on calligraphic abstraction. It underscores the idea that 'abstraction' was not the ultimate goal of Lee's art, but rather a process that led him toward the idealized painting he envisioned.
