Art of East Asia in 20th Century and Today

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Table of Contents

Introduction. Art in China
Korean Art Specifics
Uniqueness of South Korean Art
Art in North Korea
Harbour Scene and In Front of Tiananmen
Bibliography

Introduction. Art in China

Through art, people can expose their ideas, their opposition to the government rules and regulations in a quiet way. “The Chinese art work collection shows us the culture and their different views and opinions regarding the democratic situations. In china, experimental art has not get proper support and it is criticize by orthodox art critics.But later some people support these great art and they divided the art with different views and ideological positions. But some people oppose the mixing of style and culture and then later in 1990s there exist a great support of this Chinese experimental art.” (Hung, n.d, p.1). The artists try to expose their revolutionary ideas and motivate the people to fight against the cruel actions of the government. The concept of Chinese government about art is that it must always serve the people and the government is always ready to promote art by giving systematic education about the new art. They always give preferences to the revolutionary art.The best method of understanding the Chinese experimental art is to analyse the history of art and it is the main flexible designation of their tradition. There are different levels of artistic concepts in China which include the modern art, religious art, commercial art etc.Feudalism and landlordism come under the religious art and the concept of religious arts is mainly superstitious. In the revolutionary period of China, government was successful to create art gallery in western part of Beijing’s Forbidden City. During 1960s China suffered political and economic crisis. During that period the Chinese government forced the artistic people to do something for overcoming the crisis by developing new painting concepts. During that period new iconographic types like ‘Sun Zixi, In Front of Tiananmen’ appeared in socialists Realists art. Sun Zixi, In Front of Tiananmen, 1964, China is a canvas painting, which played a powerful role to create an impact on the Chinese art history. It is the pictorial representation of the photograph that several Chinese people paused to take a photograph of them in front of Chairman Mao’s portrait in Tiananmen Square, which is main political hub. The painting symbolizes the victory of the socialist realism during the Maoist period.

Korean Art Specifics

The Korean artistic approach is somewhat different from that of the Russian style artistic culture. “Contemporary Korean art indicate the importance of ‘ourselves’ in a nation and the significance of complex relationships with the outside, or the realm outside ourselves.” (Young-Chul, et at, 2007, p.175). They got artistic influence from other countries like Russia and China, because the artistic culture of those two countries was famous during the revolutionary period. Contemporary Korean art history is however revealed, not through the recognition of continuous specificity, but through the exposure of Korea’s cultural geography. North Korean art is mainly based on the revolutionary concept which made greater impact among the people at that time. They also gave importance to craft work and other art work. The Koreans gave great consideration to the traditional art work. The North Koreans used their artistic talent as a weapon to reveal their culture. It also helped to reveal their opposition against the foreign governments. The North Korean artists put some realistic approach in their painting. And they include the great personalities and various revolutionary concepts in their pictures. The artistic approach of North Koreans is parallel to Chinese. The Tower of Socialist Revolution and Socialist Construction, 1972, North Korea symbolically represents unity of 106 people for constructing socialism in their country.

Uniqueness of South Korean Art

The South Korean art is entirely different from that of Asian and Chinese art. But these two arts can bring some impact in the development of South Korean art. Tower of Socialist Revolution and Socialist Construction, 1972, North Korea can reveal socialistic revolution among the people of North Korea and the Hong Sungdam, Harbour scene (from Kwangju uprising), 1989, South Korea gives the situation of the Korean harbour during 1980s. The poverty of the harbour people and the feudal mind of the authority are pictorially represented here. The picture mainly criticizes their political situations at that time and the economic gap between the people of South Korea before they got freedom. The artist reveals the attitude towards the feudal government through this picture. During 1980s, people of South Korea were at the mood of getting democracy and the fight against feudal government was occurring in South Korea during that period. Through these arts, they were trying to make some revolutions in the country. By taking cubism as an art, they were trying to incorporate several artistic approaches from different countries, and political situations together. Cubism originated in Paris. But Koreans have also taken cubism in their art. Cubism also tried to reveal the traditional and economic situations of the country. Also cubism supported the colonization of the people because it helped the art to mix several cultures and art. The contemporary artistic approach of South Korea offered large benefit for the development of the nation. By getting inspiration they were ready to fight against the feudal government for their liberty. By taking cubism it was very easy to analyze the expressions of each character within the picture. “Cubism is the essential approach to image creation such as spatial and temporal fragmentation, abstract qualities, rejection of past conventions, and its appropriation of popular culture and also it connects to the notation of avant-garde.” (Mashad, n.d, p.228).

Art in North Korea

The ‘Tower of Socialist Revolution and Socialist Construction’ was the combined art work of many artists in Korea. It demonstrates the creation of socialism in North Korea. So, the art of North Korea mainly focused on showing the struggle of the democratic people in creating a socialist nation. The struggles of the socialist people caused rapid development of this nation. “Korean art is derived from the theoretical background from opponents and writers in France in early 1950s.

The Korean informal artists incorporate the specialities of Paris art wok such as synonimity between the works which sometimes leads to difficulties to differentiate between the French and Korean art.Korean artists exploit some unclear ideas that reveal the artistic spirit or sensibility of the internal self, including the spontaneous patch, the direct brushstroke, and the tactility of a canvas covered in thickly applied paint.” (Young-Chul, et at, 2007, p.177).

‘Sun Zixi, In Front of Tiananmen, 1964’ is the national art of China. It is one of the excellent works of the famous artist Sun Zixi and this picture is done on oil painting. The art “In Front of Tiananmen” shows the modern and customary culture of the Chinese people who are leading very joyful and peaceful life. And this unity of the people depicts that there were no discrimination among the rich and poor people in China. “In the history of Chinese art, oil painting is mainly subject oriented and which is became the new revolutionary iconography in china.Thus it is being preserve in the galleries of the Museum of the Chinese Revolution.” (Andrews and Cedsj, 1998, p.2). The artist mainly focused on the current issues of their nation and how the people led their life when they became republic. It helps to provide more information to the public about their country. They also brought latest techniques in oil painting to make the picture more realistic. The artists established a new way of art for the constituted country and they included the political affairs and societal issues against the existing government policies. Thus, through the art, the artists tried to bring revolutionary changes for their nation. The government supported the new art and also bought new policies for the goodwill of the nation. So, oil painting has got a great influence in the new revolutionary changes of China.

“Influence of cubism in Asian culture is very important. Cubism is come in to countries like Japan in early 20^th centuries and china in 1920s and in Korea 1930s.”m(Akira, n.d, p.1)

Harbour Scene and In Front of Tiananmen

Harbour scene (from Kwangju uprising) is the art work of Hong Sungdam. This picture is done in oil paint and variety of colours is used to make this picture more striking. The picture reveals the battle between the civilians and the government.

This picture shows the poor condition of the people after the great conflict in Korea. During the war in 1980 between the civilians and government, there caused a great loss in the harbour, many people died, injured, lost their home and so on. So, after the conflict there was poverty, diseases etc. The artist has clearly shown the terrible condition of the people who remained. Many people were crying in loss of their parents, children, relatives and some were crying due to pain as they were injured badly during the struggle. The people were staying in the street as they lost their home and even they were preparing the food on the street itself. Through the picture the artist tried to bring out the terrible situation of the people in the harbour and the cruelty of the government towards the civilians. The government authorities were enjoying in their victory while the poor people were facing the difficulties. The government was not concerned or aware about the public and for their own benefit they were behaving badly towards the civilians. This art work has got huge influence in making this nation a democratic country. Even though the people lost many things they struggled against the government authorities. This picture is really an uprising of Kwangju during the period of 1980s. This picture has included each and every matter in harbour at that period. By analyzing this picture one can clearly understand the situation of that port. “During the revolutionary period new iconographic type appeared in Socialist Realist art. Whereas a typical painting done in 1960. such as Li Qi’s Portrait of Mao Zedong (cat. 139), glorifies China’s leader, oil paintings such as Sun Zixi’s In Front of Tiananmen, 1964, and Wen Bao’s Four Girls,1962 (cats. 137, 138), have China’s happy people as their subject.” (Andrews and Cedsj, 1998, p.4).

Also in the category of oil painting they tried to involve the feelings of poor people in that time. During revolutionary era Liu Wenxi and Fang Zengxian are used socialist realism approach in their work. They used several artistic methods oil painting, Chinese figure painting etc in their work.

One of the differences of this image from the picture of ‘Sun Zixi, In Front of Tiananmen’ is that in the picture ‘harbour scene’ all the people are unhappy while in the other image all the people are happy. In the picture ‘In Front of Tiananmen’ the background scène and people’s image look very realistic and the picture is sketched in the way the people are posing to the camera. The people of china celebrated the fundamental modification of their country side as a patriotic festivity. So the artist has taken this subject in their art work. As china got benefit from the art and recognized it is essential the government encouraged the artists to bring new art. The oil paintings are result of Chinese history in which revolutionary changes of china are the main topic of oil paintings. Even though some of their art work pursued soviet patterns their theme was fully Chinese itself.

Bibliography

Akira, Tatehata. n.d. Cubism in Asia: Introduction, 1. (Provided by the customer).

Andrews, Julia F, and Cedsj, K. Shen. 1998. Victory of socialism: Oil painting and the new Guohua. The Ohio Stat University, 2. (Provided by the customer).

Hung, Wu. n.d. A Decade of Chinese experimental art (1990-2000), 1. (Provided by the customer).

Mashad, Ahmad. n.d. Chapter 2: Cubism and Modernity: Negotiation modernities: Encounters with Cubism in Asian art, 228. (Provided by the customer).

Young-Chul, Lee, et at. 2007. Elastic taboos within the Korean world of contemporary art: Identity of contemporary Korean art. Verlag Fur Moderne Kunst Nurnbert, 175. (provided by the customer).

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