[2025 Art SG]

Park Seo-Bo (1931 - 2023)

Park Seo-Bo was a seminal figure in Korean contemporary art. He was one of the founding members of the Dansaekhwa movement, which emerged in the early 1970s post-war Korea and has since gained international recognition. In the late 1960s, Park began the ‘Ecriture’ series by repeating pencil lines over wet monochromatic painted surfaces. Later, he expanded the language through the introduction of hanji (traditional Korean paper) and color. The work is brought into being through the process of repetitive actions of pasting, scraping, scratching, and rubbing. It delicately balances drawing and painting in a quest for emptiness through reduction. Park’s work has been exhibited internationally, including: Museum of Fine Art, Boston, United States; the Venice Biennale, Italy; Samsung Museum of Art, Seoul, South Korea; Singapore Art Museum, Singapore; Kunsthalle Wien, Vienna, Austria; Tate Liverpool, United Kingdom; Brooklyn Museum, New York, United States; and Expo 67, Montreal, Canada. Park’s work is included in the collections of the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, New York, United States; M+, Hong Kong, China; Guggenheim Abu Dhabi, UAE; The National Museum of Contemporary Art, Seoul, South Korea; and the K20, Kunstsammlung Nordrhein-Westfalen, Düsseldorf, Germany.

Kim Chong Hak (b.1937)

Kim Chong Hak, often referred to as Flower's Painter, is celebrated for his abstract art that emphasizes the inherent beauty of nature. His creative process involves internalizing the joy found in nature and reimagining it onto canvas. In the 1980s, Kim immersed himself in the Seoraksan Mountain, both in theme and living, inspired by its distinct seasonal traits, with a different name for each season. He still speaks fondly of his time in the mountains and his artistic expression of the seasons' colors. His work has been featured in major international exhibitions and projects, including: the Busan Museum of Art, Busan, South Korea; Vitality at Galerie Perrotin, Paris, France; Musée Guimet, Paris, France; SeMA Nam Seoul Living Art Museum, Seoul, South Korea; Whanki Museum, Seoul, South Korea; Ewha Museum, Seoul, South Korea; Kumho Museum, Seoul, South Korea. Kim Chong Hak’s work is in the permanent collections of many museums, including the National Museum of Korea, Seoul, South Korea; National Museum of Modern and Contemporary Art, Gwacheon, South Korea; Leeum, Samsung Museum of Art, Seoul, South Korea; Seoul Museum of Art, Seoul, South Korea; and Busan Museum of Art, Busan, South Korea. Currently, the Kim Chong Hak Museum is in plans to be built in Busan, South Korea, whereas the Architect Kengo Kuma participates as a designer.

Kishio Suga (b.1944)

Kishio Suga is a Japanese artist known for pioneering site-specific installation art. He created ephemeral arrangements of natural and man-made materials in outdoor and indoor settings, gaining recognition for groundbreaking installations like "Parallel Strata" (1969) and "Soft Concrete" (1970). As part of the Mono-ha movement, he used unaltered natural and industrial materials to explore the interplay between elements, space, and materials. Since the mid-1980s, Suga has adapted his installations to new sites while maintaining their core concepts. His diverse practice includes assemblages, works on paper, and performances called "Activations." He is also a prolific writer, with novels, essays, and a screenplay to his name. Suga has had numerous solo exhibitions at international museums, most recently at Dia: Chelsea, New York, United States (2016–17), Pirelli Hangar Bicocca, Milan, Italy (2016), and the Museum of Contemporary Art, Tokyo, Japan (2015). A re-creation of his iconic installation Law of Situation (1971) was presented at the 57th Venice Biennale, Italy (2017). Over the past four decades he has been featured in landmark exhibitions at the Centre Georges Pompidou, Paris, France; the Guggenheim Museum, New York, United States; the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art, San Francisco, United States; the Museum of Modern Art, New York, United States; the Punta della Dogana, Venice, Italy; and his work is included in many public and private collections.

Lee Bae (b. 1956)

Lee Bae focuses on the expressive potential of charcoal as a medium. Over the course of three decades, Lee has dedicated himself to creating a diverse range of iterations of Korean painting through his use of charcoal and abstract forms that are self-sufficient and rich in spiritual and energetic qualities. By exploring immanent notions such as yielding, respiring, and circulation, which are embodied by charcoal as a material, Lee's work resonates with themes of life and death, absence and presence, light and shadow, form, and emptiness. Lee's oeuvre spans a wide range of mediums and forms, from drawings to canvas-based works, as well as installations, with each new work serving to expand upon his unique vision and approach. Lee’s works have been featured at museums and institutions worldwide including: Phi Foundation, Montreal, Canada; Indang Museum, Daegu, South Korea; Wilmotte Foundation, Venice, Italy; Fondation Maeght, Saint-Paul de Vence, France; Musée des Beaux-Arts, Vannes, France; and Musée Guimet, Paris, France. Among many others, Lee’s work is in the permanent collections of museums including the National Museum of Contemporary Art, Gwacheon, South Korea; Seoul Museum of Art, Seoul, South Korea; Leeum-Samsung Museum of Art, Seoul, South Korea; Fondation Maeght, Saint-Paul de Vence, France; Musée Guimet, Paris, France; Baruj Foundation, Barcelona, Spain, and Privada Allegro Foundation, Madrid, Spain.

Jung Kwang Ho (b.1959)

Jung Kwang Ho, who aims to weave between painting and sculpture, desires to explore the essence and interpretation of sculpture in particular. A sculpture is a tangible representation of an image manifested by the sculptor using materials, techniques, and tools to create a specific object in a particular way. Jung oxymoronically refers to his works as "non-sculptural sculptures," as he works with non-sculptural properties to create essentially sculptural works. The paradoxical expression is part of how he explores the essence of sculpture. The artist made no distinction between inside and outside, instead exposing the surface and penetrating through to suggest that surfaces are merely the superficial layer of sculptural essence and the surface of reality. Jung presented solo exhibitions in various museums worldwide, including the Stedelijk Museum, Amsterdam, Netherlands, Art Sonje Museum, Gyeongju, South Korea, Kumho Art Museum, Seoul, South Korea, Gallery Thomas, Munich, Germany, Lumen Gallery, Paris, France, and Canvas International Art Gallery, Amsterdam, Netherlands. He also participated in significant group exhibitions at institutions such as the Seoul Museum of Art, Seoul, South Korea, Samsung Museum of Art Leeum, Seoul, South Korea, Singapore Art Museum, Singapore, and Gyeonggi Museum of Art, Ansan, South Korea. His works are held in various collections, including the National Museum of Modern and Contemporary Art, Seoul, South Korea, Daejeon Museum of Art, Daejeon, South Korea, Hanlim Museum of Art, Daejeon, South Korea, Sonje Museum of Contemporary Art, Gyeongju, South Korea, and Ho-Am Art Museum, Seoul, South Korea.

Lee Kwang Ho (b. 1967)

Lee Kwang Ho is a representative figure in realism paintings. He takes daily subject matters and takes the reproduction of their forms into a unique language of his own. Although realism seems like quite a laborious task and sometimes compulsive as well, through the pictorial depiction of Lee Kwang Ho, we see the reconstructed reality fabricated by his intentions. Subjects that are expressed both vigorously and dramatically expose the desires of their subconscious, and also stimulates the tactility of those that behold them. In his wetland series, he experiments with techniques like scratching and tapping on the canvas. Upon closer inspection, the depicted subjects dissolve, leaving behind a layer of paint with precise brushstrokes and meticulous knife work, which emphasizes the exploration of the fundamental question of painting - the act of painting itself. Lee has held solo exhibitions in various venues, including Johyun Gallery, Busan, South Korea; Kukje Gallery, Seoul, South Korea; and Chang dong Studio Gallery, Seoul, South Korea; and has participated in group exhibitions at Seoul Museum of Art, Seoul, South Korea; Busan Museum of Art, Busan, South Korea; Gana Art Center, Seoul, South Korea; and Saatchi Gallery, London, United Kingdom. His works are included in prestigious collections such as the National Museum of Modern and Contemporary Art, Seoul, South Korea; the Seoul Museum of Art, Seoul, South Korea; the Gyeonggi Museum of Art, Ansan, South Korea, and the Jeju Museum of Art, South Korea.

Bosco Sodi (b. 1970)

Bosco Sodi is an artist working globally, known for his densely textured paintings and objects with rich and vivid colors. His paintings are crystallized forms of arduous physical application; a constant cultivation of removing any hint of his own intent in the painting and populating the surface with the essence of material and fortuitous development. The artist works with the canvas laid down horizontally, applying a viscous mixture of soil, sawdust, glue and pigment to aggregate and then left to solidify over time. This process is a performance of sorts. That performance may last up to several months, with each accumulated strata of material testimony to the artist’s actions. Eventually, in that process, the layers cleft, and that is when the performance ends. From then on, all is left to time and nature’s forces. Cracks appear naturally on the surface and traces of material transforming from the material to the substrate to the whole of the artwork - a strikingly formal experiment in painting. Sodi’s works are included in various public and private collections, such as Ishikawa Prefectural Museum of Art, Kanazawa, Japan; Harvard Art Museums, MA, United States; Museum of Contemporary Art, Antwerp, Belgium; Museum Voorlinden, Wassenaar, Netherlands; and the National Gallery of Victoria, Melbourne, Australia.

Lee So Yeun (b.1971)

Lee So Yeun's self-portraits, reminiscent of identification photos, vividly depict snapshots of her life's journey and the epochs she has navigated. Depicted with bold forms and luminous hues, the objects laden with multiple meanings evoke a subtle theatrical atmosphere and an unusual intimacy. It weaves together elements of similarity and contrast, delicately balancing between closeness and estrangement. Lee So Yeun majored in fine art in South Korea and continued her studies at the Münster Kunst Academy in Germany. Her nomination for Düsseldorf's "Emprise Art Prize" catalysed her recognition within the German art sector. By 2005, she earned the "Young Artist Award" from the Columbus Art Foundation in Ravensburg, Germany. From 2006, she collaborated exclusively with Düsseldorf's esteemed Conrad Gallery, achieving international acclaim at renowned art fairs including the Cologne Art Colony in Germany, Show Off in Paris, France, ARCO in Madrid, Spain, and Scope and Pulse Art Fairs in New York, United States. She has showcased solo exhibitions at Kunsthaus Essen, Germany (2014), Johyun Gallery, South Korea (2014), and Space K, South Korea (2013). She also participated in notable group exhibitions at the Gyeonggi Museum of Modern Art, South Korea (2018), Sejong Centre, South Korea (2017), Amway Museum, South Korea (2016), Pohang Museum of Steel Art, South Korea (2015), and Gallery Lux, South Korea (2015). Currently, her works are part of collections at TCB collection in Japan, Achenbach Art Consulting in Germany, the Columbus Foundation, and t.VIS.t Communication in Madrid, Spain.

Jin Meyerson (b.1972)

Jin Meyerson, is recognized for his contributions to the revival of figurative painting in the early 2000’s in NYC where he began his career. A pioneer of early randomization CG systems in concert with painting, his work bridges figuration and abstraction by engaging with issues of displacement, loss of heritage, post-colonialism, and the expansive Korean diaspora. His recent work employ LIDR scans, AR overlays and ideas of retro causality, as source and origin on his longstanding investigation of meaning and contemporaneity in painting. His paintings have been featured in extensive solo and group exhibitions globally, including: The 2022 Venice Biennale, Italy; Gallery2 + Johyun Gallery, Seoul + Busan, South Korea; M Woods Museum, Beijing, China; Zach Feuer Gallery, NYC, United States; Galerie Emmanuel Perrotin, Paris, France, and Hong Kong, China; The Saatchi Gallery, London, United Kingdom; Galerie Nordine Zidoun, Luxembourg; Arario Gallery, Seoul and Cheonan, South Korea; Hakgojae Gallery, Seoul, South Korea, and Shanghai, China; and Pearl Lam Gallery, Hong Kong, China. His work can be found in numerous public and private collections, including: the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, NYC, United States; The Saatchi Collection, London, United Kingdom; Vanhaerents Art Collection, Brussels, Belgium; Dean Valentine Collection, LA, United States; the de la Cruz Collection, Miami, United States; the Speyer Family Collection, NYC, United States; the Yuz Foundation, Jakarta, Indonesia, and Shanghai, China; the Taguchi Art Collection, Tokyo, Japan; MACAN Museum, Jakarta, Indonesia; and the Sansab Museum, Bangkok, Thailand.