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Lot Essay
Appearing for the first time in Christie's Hong Kong Evening Sale, Nam Kwan is one of the best recognized painters in the history of Korean modern art along with his contemporary artist, Rhee Seundja and Kim Whan-Ki. Like many other modern Korean artists, Nam Kwan first encountered Western abstract art indirectly in Japan. Under Japanese academicism, Nam intensively probed a wide range of European oil paintings from Impressionism to Cubism and Fauvism, seeking his own colours and compositional forms. Though he had always craved originality in his art, it was, however, the Korean War that desperately urged him to develop his own style suitable for expressing his tragic and horrendous experience of war.
In 1954, Nam decided to move to Paris in order to gain direct exposure to Western art. He developed his own visual language by learning from Western masters who had successfully expressed their war experiences and also practice his art in a new environment. At that time, Paris was filled with a flow of Art Informel movement and Nam vigorously absorbed Tachisme technique of dripping paints only because he found it most appropriate to create texture he wanted to express.
Through extensive experiments with various materials and techniques, by the early 1960s, Nam began to develop his signature style and motif: unique shapes evoking letters, historical remains, stones, crown from the Silla Dynasty, and Korean traditional mask. As he recalls, 'I am employing old themes from my motherland-ancient remains, masks, ancient plant pattern.' Unlike renowned Western calligraphy abstract paintings by Hans Hartung, Mark Tobey, and Franz Klein, who most pursued free brushstrokes of spontaneous energy and action, Nam preferred to carefully devise letter shapes and make them constructive and figurative. Nam's signature ideogram style continued to evolve into the next stage; emphasizing structure by employing the repeated letters and various shapes of ideograms combined with masks in an architectural format which occupied more of the canvas during the 1970s and 1980s.
Inner Reflection (Lot 73) featured here is a representative example that demonstrates his mature technique and evolved styles employing the ideograms during the 1980s. Blue colour in the painting evokes Korean traditional royal garments dyed by extraction from plants and flowers. Nam's signature ideograms combined with historical ruins, Chinese and Korean characters, and human faces signify rich history of humans and Nam tried to express hope and at the same time futility of life. Bernard Dorival is one among many French critics who praised Nam's works. He wrote in 1973, 'Nam's work is a great example of sophisticated and exquisite sensibility of East Asia.'
In 1954, Nam decided to move to Paris in order to gain direct exposure to Western art. He developed his own visual language by learning from Western masters who had successfully expressed their war experiences and also practice his art in a new environment. At that time, Paris was filled with a flow of Art Informel movement and Nam vigorously absorbed Tachisme technique of dripping paints only because he found it most appropriate to create texture he wanted to express.
Through extensive experiments with various materials and techniques, by the early 1960s, Nam began to develop his signature style and motif: unique shapes evoking letters, historical remains, stones, crown from the Silla Dynasty, and Korean traditional mask. As he recalls, 'I am employing old themes from my motherland-ancient remains, masks, ancient plant pattern.' Unlike renowned Western calligraphy abstract paintings by Hans Hartung, Mark Tobey, and Franz Klein, who most pursued free brushstrokes of spontaneous energy and action, Nam preferred to carefully devise letter shapes and make them constructive and figurative. Nam's signature ideogram style continued to evolve into the next stage; emphasizing structure by employing the repeated letters and various shapes of ideograms combined with masks in an architectural format which occupied more of the canvas during the 1970s and 1980s.
Inner Reflection (Lot 73) featured here is a representative example that demonstrates his mature technique and evolved styles employing the ideograms during the 1980s. Blue colour in the painting evokes Korean traditional royal garments dyed by extraction from plants and flowers. Nam's signature ideograms combined with historical ruins, Chinese and Korean characters, and human faces signify rich history of humans and Nam tried to express hope and at the same time futility of life. Bernard Dorival is one among many French critics who praised Nam's works. He wrote in 1973, 'Nam's work is a great example of sophisticated and exquisite sensibility of East Asia.'