The Final Exit to Reach for the Art_Chung-Hee Kim’s Art Theory

 

 

도86 <소심란> 지본수묵 김정희. 55.0×31.1cm. 개인 소장

 

The Final Exit to Reach for the Art

 

                            II
Chung-Hee Kim’s Art Theory in the Tradition of Asian
                            Literati Art

In Asia, art was regarded as “You-Ki-Hwal-Dong (an extracurricular
activity or practice for bracing one’s mind to be a virtuous person)”and
as a way of “Su-Ki(修己) or Su-Sim (修心).”This is a way of “selfcriticism
or self-education”which is used to reach one’s goals and
ideals, to be a virtuous man or gentleman especially as it related to
scholars.(君子) I will examine the core thought of Asian scholarly
art through the study of the Korean scholar and artist, Chung-Hee
Kim and his works.

Chung-Hee Kim is known as a great Korean scholar - artist of
the eighteenth and nineteenth century, especially with respect to
calligraphy. He is well recognized by the art community and the
general public in Korea. Chung-Hee Kim, like other Asian scholars,
did not publicly air his views on the theory of art. Like most
Asian scholars, he rarely talked about art theories directly. Even
Asian scholars and artists have not said the “beauty.”There are
few quotes from Chung-Hee Kim regarding his stance on art theory.
Traditionally art practices in Asia including Korea have been

more focused on the creation of art as a means to becoming a virtuous
person by bracing one’s mind and there has been limited focus
on defining art theory.

Chung-Hee Kim insists “Seo-Kweon-Ki(書卷氣)”and “Mun-
Ja-Hwang(文字香)”are essentially to practicing art. This simply
means works of art should be based on the artist’s philosophy and
scholarship. It could be connected with“ self-criticism,”and it also
equated with “creativity and uniqueness.”This could be also connected
to the concept of “avant-garde art”by Clement Greenberg.
In calligraphy, one of Chung-Hee Kim’s predominant artistic
forms was that he explored and mastered all pre-masters’calligraphy
style before creating his own style. In the process he gradually
developed his own style. His calligraphy is very different from the
traditional style, making his style so unique. This explains why
almost people including scholars call Chung-Hee Kim’s artistic
style unconventional and exceptional. Many scholars simply note
that Chung-Hee Kim went against the tradition. However, his procedure
of creating his own artistic style while studying and mastering
traditional artistic styles was surely based on tradition.
Arguably the same could be said about the aspect of avant-garde
art in Greenberg’s terms. Chung-Hee Kim did not want to stay in

the realm of tradition. He always tried to develop his
style.

For another aspect of Asian scholarly art, I would
like to cite a quote by Hee-Meng Kang (1423-1483).
Kang was also a scholar-official and an artist during
the Cho-sun Dynasty in Korea. If we look at his citation
we can get a better comprehension of his views on
art.

論畵說曰凡人之技藝雖同而用心則異. 君子之於藝寓意而
己, 小人之於藝留意而己留意於藝者工師隷匠賣技食力者
之所爲也. 寓意於藝者如高人雅士心深妙理者之所爲也. 豈
可留意於彼而累其心哉.

According to ‘Ron-Hwa-Sul,(Theory of Painting)’art
technique is all the same to the people, however, it is
very different in its use. A virtuous man always sticks
his artistic technique into his body and soul, but a little
man sticks his skill into his body temporally and
then he sells his skill for making profit. A little man’s
art is to sell his artistic skill for making money after
studying art from his master, while a virtuous man’s
art is just like a beautiful upright scholar to study profound
truth and philosophy deeply for the world. How

can I sell my artistic skill for making money?5)
Chung-Hee Kim’s thoughts are not so different from the
quote above, if we look at the citation in the introduction. As we
can see Asian scholars have not created their art works for any
profit-making purposes. This notion is also the same as the concept
of avant-grade art.

In Asia, scholars do not describe their subject matters as looking
as real. They try to get the essentially parts from their subjects
which represent the subjects. That is the reason why almost all
scholarly paintings are quite abstract yet still recognizable and
understandable. (This is the only difference between the two different cultures.)
And the status of scholars is almost the same as that of elites.
All of them are well educated people and are considered among
society’s elites.

It has been very difficult to study Chung-Hee Kim and his
works because there have not been reliable books about Chung-
Hee Kim and his works until now. Too many inauthentic works are
regarded as Chung-Hee Kim’s works and many people in Korea
and people in any other countries have studied on his inauthentic

works.6) The other reason is that his world of scholarship
and philosophy of art is too broad and deep. He
mastered many subjects: classic literature, history, philosophy,
poetry, calligraphy, and painting. He also
mastered some religious philosophy and theory in
Confucianism, Buddhism, Daoism and others.
However, I do not wish to explore these in much detail
in this paper.

ⓒ 모암문고 www.moamcollection.org