- Title
- Fisherman at Sea with Cranes
- Culture
- Korean
- Date Made
- Post 1945, mid 20th-early 21st century
- Medium
- Ink and color on paper
- Dimensions
- Mount: 17 1/2 × 31 in. (44.45 × 78.74 cm)
Image: 11 × 20 3/4 in. (27.94 × 52.71 cm)
- Accession Number
- M.2020.13.3
- Collecting Area
- Chinese and Korean Art
- Curatorial Notes
Suh Se-Ok was a fervent proponent of calligraphy and in 1959 founded the short-lived but influential Mungnimhoe (Ink Forest Society), a collective of experimental ink painters and fellow graduates of Seoul National University who sought to propel ink painting and calligraphy into the contemporary world. However, as distinguished from his later monochromatic compositions combining abstraction and figuration, in his early career Suh produced genre scenes featuring humble subjects—usually children and animals—often accompanied by calligraphic inscriptions or poems. In Fisherman at Sea with Cranes, rendered in a traditional fan format, the undulating thick and thin outlines, sketchy brushwork, and mottled washes of the image dialogue with the varied weight of calligraphic letters. With their rustic charm, Suh’s ink-and-color genre paintings are beloved by the Korean people, achieving a status perhaps second only to the depictions of everyday life by renowned eighteenth-century artist Kim Hongdo.
Virginia Moon
2017/2024