Page 416 - Art In The Age Of Exploration (Great Section on Chinese Art Ming Dynasty)

deep, misty space in the center, "framed" by the balanced by large boulders along the water's edge 266
massed forms along either side. on the right. Slightly off center, on the largest
The pictorial means employed in each leaf boulder, a scholar lies prone, gazing out at the Yi Sumun
convey the mood of the season. In the early river in front of him. From a sheer cliff rising active first half of 15th century
winter scene, for instance, fantastic mountains are behind the solitary figure grows a canopy of over- INK BAMBOO
rendered in deep black brush strokes of fluctuat- hanging vegetation.
ing width and show sharp contrasts of light The emphasis on verticality, the concentration dated to 1424
and dark, thus evoking the harshness of nature of pictorial weight on one side, bold and assertive Korean
in winter. K.P.K. brushwork, emphatically black ink showing no album leaves; ink on paper
3
effort at subtle tonal gradation, and empty space 30.6 x 45 (12 x i/ /4J
which is not used to imply infinite recession all inscription with signature and seal of the artist
suggest prior knowledge of Chan (K: Son; J: Zen) Matsudaira Yasuharu
Buddhist painting and of the work of leading
265 Chinese Zhe school painters such as Dai Jin
(1388-1462), Li Zai (act. c. 1425-1470), and Zhou Although Yi Sumun is not mentioned in Korean
Kang Hui-an Wenjing (act. c. 143O-C. 1460), who dominated sources of the Choson period (1392-1910), his
1419-1464 painting at the Ming court, where Korean emmis- name occurs in Japanese sources of the Muro-
saries were frequent visitors. machi period (1333-1573)- He is believed to have
A SAGE IN CONTEMPLATION Under normal circumstances Chinese pictorial married a daughter of the Soga family, and his

mid-i$th century methods soon found their way to Korea. New style is considered to have been the source of the
paint-
Soga painting lineage in Japan. He taught
Korean stylistic developments introduced from China ing to the famous Zen monk Ikkyu (1394-1481),
album leaf; ink on paper were usually taken up by innovative Korean
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I
23.4 x 15.7 (9 /4 x 6 /s) scholar-painters, each innovation initiating a new of the Kyoto monastery Daitoku-ji, and was
seal of the artist progressive trend. Sage in Contemplation, which known for his monochrome ink depictions of
reveals Kang as the earliest Korean proponent of bamboo as well as for landscapes with figures and
National Museum of Korea, Seoul
the Zhe school mode, represents the progressive flower-and-bird paintings.
direction in mid-fifteenth century Korean paint- For a long time Yi Sumun (pronounced Ri
An eminent scholar-official of the early Choson ing. By the sixteenth century painting in the Zhe Shubun in Japanese) was mistaken for the famous
period, Kang Hui-an rose steadily in the bureau- style had become enormously popular in Korea. Japanese monk-painter Tensho Shubun, approxi-
cracy after passing the Erudite Examination Kang survived one of the most violent political mately his contemporary, although the two names
(munkwa) in 1441, and was sent to Beijing as struggles of the Choson dynasty, in which Prince employ a different character for the syllable Shu.
vice-ambassador of a Korean mission in 1455. He Anp'yong (1418-1453), the famous collector and To complicate matters further, Tensho Shubun
was also a noted poet, calligrapher, and painter. patron of arts, was assassinated in 1453 by the (act. first half of 15th century), who was an
Here Kang has divided the pictorial space into faction of his brother, Prince Suyang. Many important figure in early Japanese ink painting,
two planes. In the foreground is a stream indi- worthy scholar-officials perished then in their came to Korea in 1423 with a Japanese embassy
cated by horizontal brush strokes in light ink. defence of the young king, Tanjong (r. 1452- sent to obtain the printed Buddhist sutras, return-
Small rocks and water weeds at lower left are 1455), who was eliminated by his ambitious uncle, ing to Japan in 1424. This album, according to the
Prince Suyang. The ruthless Suyang, ascending inscription on the last leaf, was "painted by
the throne as King Sejo (r. 1455-1468), proved Sumun [J: Shubun] in 1424 at Pukyang after
an able ruler. In this painting the touch of self- coming over to Japan."
mockery in the sage's expression may not have Bamboo first became an important theme
been Kang's conscious intent, but it would not be among Korean scholar-painters during the twelfth
inconsistent with the probable feelings of a century (Koryo dynasty). Such prominent Koryo
scholar-official serving the usurper who had put scholars as Kim Pusik (1075-1151) and Yi Illo
to death of many of his friends and colleagues. (1152-1220) painted ink bamboo. They were great
Kang's paintings are rare and usually lack admirers of the scholar-official-poet Su Shi (1037-
inscriptions or signature. This work bears only a 1101), a seminal and leading figure in the literati
square intaglio seal reading Injae, Kang's studio painting movement in Northern Song China
name (K: ho). K.P.K. (960-1127), and of Su's friend Wen Tong (1019-
1079), who is considered the first great master of
ink bamboo. During the late thirteenth and early
fourteenth century, when the Korean court main-
tained a library named the "Hall of Ten Thousand
Volumes" (K: Mangwan Dang) in the Chinese
capital (at present-day Beijing), many Korean
scholar-officials made frequent visits there. Yi
Che-hyon (1287-1367), who served the Korean
King Ch'ungson, became acquainted with the
painters Zhao Mengfu (1254-1322) and Li Kan
(1245-1320) —both known for their bamboo
painting, and the latter also for his Treatise on
Bamboo (Zhupu). To the Confucian scholar-offi-
cials who dominated the succeeding Choson

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