Widely recognised as a pioneer of Korean abstract art, Kim Whanki persistently interrogated the abstraction of form, colour, and line in his signature dot paintings in blue.
Read MoreKim was born in Shinan, Jeolla Province in the early years of the Japanese occupation of Korea. He became familiar with the work of European modernists in the early 1930s, then studying at Tokyo's Nihon University.
In addition to his blue paintings, in which canvases are entirely filled with small, mosaic-like dots, Kim often painted a wide range of subjects including Korean ceramics, traditional symbols of longevity, and natural landscapes.
An early painting, When the Larks Sing (1935), shows Kim's experimentation with figuration and abstraction: a woman's body and hanbok, while representational, are painted in simplified forms and colouration, while the basket atop her head is rendered partially transparent to reveal its content.
Upon returning to Seoul in 1937, Kim befriended avantgarde artists and intellectuals, among them painters Yoo Youngkuk, Lee Gyu Sang, and Kim Yong-Jun, as well as left-wing poet Jeong Ji-Yong and writer Lee Tae-Joon. Kim began exploring abstraction with such works as Rondo (1938), in which curves, lines, and colour planes give rise to sinuous shapes and human-like silhouettes.
Kim's aspirations to study overseas and expand his practice led him to depart Seoul for Paris with his second wife, writer Byun Dong-Rim (also known as Kim HyangAn), in 1956. Paintings from the following three years reveal the artist's continuing engagement with abstraction. In Jar and Flowers (1949), made while still in Seoul, Kim portrays the roundish shape of a traditional Korean ceramic in white and pale grey, shining against a darker greenish background. Plum Blossoms and Jar (1957), by comparison, features bold and rough black lines to highlight the forms of the jar and flower branches.
In addition to Korean ceramics, Kim often painted classical Korean subjects, including symbols associated with longevity, featured in Immortal Things (1956–1957) and Mountain (1957). Blue, which later became a signature colour in the artist's oeuvre, also appears with more frequency during this period.
After a stint in Seoul, Kim relocated to New York in 1963, where he lived and worked for the rest of his life. There, he came into contact with fellow expatriates, among them Kim Tschang-Yeul, Nam June Paik, and Han YongJin. During this time, he also encountered the work of Colour Field painters including Mark Rothko and Barnett Newman.
It was also in New York that Kim's work began to employ his minute dots. The earlier work Sounds of Spring 4-1-1966 (1966) features rectangular dots in green, blue, and red, spread spaciously across a vertical canvas, while they become denser and more monochromatic in the later painting 26-I-70 (1970).
The 1970s saw Kim use various shades of blue in his paintings, which create a sense of movement, light, and depth. Among his most recognised works in this vein is Universe 05-IV-71 #200 (1971)—also his only diptych—in which small dots radiate out from the centre of a circle in each panel. Exhibited in Kim's solo show at Poindexter Gallery, New York in 1971, the work was also included in the 13th São Paulo Biennial in 1975, and in 2019 set the record for the highest-selling piece of Korean art to ever be sold at auction.
Kim was an influential figure in the history of modern Korean art, teaching at the Seoul National University (1946–1948) and Hongik University (1959–1962) as well as serving as the president of the National Federation of Arts, Seoul and the president of the Fine Arts Association of Korea. The Whanki Foundation, established in 1975 by his widow, founded the Whanki Museum in 1992 in Seoul.
Although Kim spent the last decade of his life in New York, he is also credited as a pioneer of Dansaekhwa or Korean Monochrome Painting, a term referring to a constellation of artists who, in the 1970s, began examining the physicality of painting through commonplace materials. Leading figures of Dansaekhwa include Park Seo-Bo, Kim's student, and Yun Hyong-Keun, his son-in-law. Kim's work is often included in thematic exhibitions focusing on Dansaekhwa.
Kim Whanki exhibited in various cities in his lifetime, including Seoul, Paris, New York, and São Paulo, and his work continues to be shown internationally.
Solo exhibitions include Kim Whanki: Poetry and Song, Seojung Art, Busan (2022); Kim Whanki, Daegu Art Museum (2018); The Aesthetics of Colors, Whanki Museum, Seoul (2017); KIM WHANKI LINE • SURFACE • DOT, Gallery Hyundai, Seoul (2015).
Group exhibitions include Korean Abstract Art: Kim Whanki and Dansaekhwa, Powerlong Museum, Shanghai (2018); Ode to Forgetting, Nam-Seoul Museum of Art (SeMA), Seoul (2017); When Process Becomes Form: Dansaekhwa and Korean Abstraction, Boghossian Foundation, Brussels (2016); Dansaekhwa, Collateral Event of the 56th Venice Biennale, organised by Boghossian Foundation, Kukje Gallery, and Tina Kim Gallery (2015).
Sherry Paik | Ocula | 2022
