Chung Chang Sup was a leading figure in the monochrome movement dansaekhwa, whose work was a reflection of his Taoist belief that the artist must balance material and nature in the unified act of doing to achieve harmony.
Return One-G, 1977. Source: Kukje Gallery, Seoul.
Born in 1927, the late artist belonged to the so-called "foundation generation" in Korea, which not only had the potential, but also faced the question of reestablishing the nation in the wake of colonization Japanese which ended in 1945, and the Korean war, which took place from 1950 to 1953.
The apparent task of Chung, a graduate of the Seoul National University, was to reinvent the national identity with his art creating a distinctive Korean style out of his artistic awareness and brilliant sensibility.
Through materials such as the Korean mulberry paper that he used as a vehicle for his art, Chung produced a composition that is reminiscent of the first advances in the abstract art, giving it a sense of balance that embodies more of a Taoist essence through monochrome movement dansaekhwa, a synthesis of traditional Korean spirit and Western abstraction that emerged in the early 1970s.
Although this Korean painting style has never been defined with a manifesto, the artists affiliated with it mainly share a restricted palette of neutral tones, such as white, beige and black, hence the general term dansaekhwa, which means single color.
Since for the Korean painter it was essential that the artist be able to balance the material and nature in the unified act of doing to achieve harmony, he was one of the main mentors of the movement that emerged as a reaction to informal art and abstract expressionism, seeking cleaning the art of self-expression or emotional outpouring that simple strokes and vibrant colors used to carry.
Sympathy 33, 1968. Source: Kukje Gallery, Seoul.
As part of the first generation of artists educated in South Korea after his release, Chung Chang Sup is, in the end, a father of abstract painting who experimented with Informal Art, monochrome and minimalist painting in a permanent search for the identity of Korean art.
Despite his death in Seoul in 2011, he continues to be especially known for his paintings on mulberry paper. dakjong, or works of so (mulberry bark), produced by adhering wet fibers extracted from the bark of the tree directly on the canvas.
All the possibilities of paper so korean are explored in the series Meditation, which ran from the early 1990s until the artist's death in 2011.
By hitting and kneading the canvas, unknowingly, according to the late painter, I put his breath, smell and finally soul into the process, thus becoming part of the process itself. Once in tune with the painter's vision, the viewer can discover lights dazzling that are deeply comforting.
When you were young, the first thing you saw when you woke up was the soft sunlight streaming through a tak paper window. (...) Through that tak paper screen, one can distinctly feel the wind, light and the flow of time outside their room, allowing us to experience both the sensation of being inside and outside. This is the realm of creation without intention to create.