The trend for contemporary Korean art is hitting the Middle East. Ana: Please Keep Your Eyes Closed for a Moment (until 2 January 2016) at the Maraya Art Centre in Sharjah is the first exhibition of contemporary Korean art at a public institution within the region.
As well as introducing young Korean artists to the art scene in the Gulf, the exhibition looks at wider notions of identity. “I wanted to question what it means to be Korean or what Korean art is,” says JW Stella, the London- and Seoul-based curator of the show. “Contemporary art from Korea was (and still is) relatively unfamiliar to the Middle East, particularly in comparison to art from China or Japan.” The exhibition features works by 12 Korean artists and one from Saudi Arabia. Standout works include a 15m-long mural by Gayoung Jun and an installation by Juyeon Kim comprised of 7,000 Emirati newspapers covered in sprouting seeds.
A growing number of cultural institutions in the Middle East are looking to Asia. In 2010, the Japanese anime Pop artist Yoshitomo Nara was the guest of honour at the Cairo Biennale. In 2011, the Mathaf Arab Museum of Modern Art, Qatar, staged a solo exhibition of works by the Chinese artist Cai Guo-Qiang and in 2012 QM Gallery Al Riwaq, also in Qatar, exhibited works by the Japanese art star Takashi Murakami.
The exhibition at Maraya also reflects the broader popularity for contemporary Korean works, particularly those associated with the Tansaekhwa movement. Tansaekhwa, which translates to “monochrome painting”, refers to a group of Korean artists who created abstract works in the aftermath of the Korean War (1950-53). “Their world was marked not only by the material deprivations experienced in the wake of the Korean War but also the realisation of imminent dispossession,” says Joan Kee, an art historian and author of Contemporary Korean Art: Tansaekhwa and the Urgency of Method.
Tansaekhwa works have entered the collections of the Guggenheim Museum in New York and Abu Dhabi; the Museum of Modern Art, New York; and the Centre Pompidou, Paris. The appetite for such art is set to continue with multiple exhibitions scheduled next year at venues including White Cube and Greene Naftali Gallery in London, and Blum and Poe in New York, Los Angeles and Tokyo. The show in Los Angeles will juxtapose works by Tansaekhwa artists and US abstract artists. “In many respects, Tansaekhwa paintings are best seen as an argument to re-plot the story of abstraction,” Kee says. She hopes that such shows will lead to greater interest in other areas of Korean art. “There's a wealth of fantastic post-war Korean art (that is post-Korean War)—that deserves a broader audience.”
Stella is determined that the interest in Korean contemporary art will not be a passing fancy. An annual artist residency programme has been established between Maraya Art Centre and Seoul Art Space in Geumcheon. “I felt it was important to connect these institutions so that they can build up a stable structure rather than a one-off engagement, enabling artists from these two very different worlds to interact with one another,” Stella says.
