Park Rehyun: Triple Interpreter

The National Museum of Modern and Contemporary Art proudly presents the major retrospective exhibition Park Rehyun: Triple Interpreter, which commemorates the 100th anniversary of the birth of Park Rehyun (1920–1976), Korea’s representative woman artist of the 20th century.

Born in the Japanese colonial period, Park Rehyun went to Tokyo to study modern Japanese ink-wash painting, but after independence, she became a pioneer of Korean ink-wash painting driven by her incessant pursuit of innovation and contemporaneity. She married Kim Kichang, who was a famous painter in his own right despite being hearing-impaired, and referred to her role as a “triple interpreter” during the couple’s international travels, when she had to translate words from English to Korean, and then deliver them to her husband through lip-reading. This exhibition focuses on her continual struggle to survive as a painter while still caring for her husband, children, and home at a time when female painters were quite rare. This exhibition comprehensively covers the major works from each period of Park’s career, from her early paintings as a student in Japan to her unique works of the 1950s and 1960s, and her art prints and tapestry works of the 1960s and 1970s. To further illustrate Park’s agonies and achievements, the exhibition also collects various essays that she wrote for newspapers and magazines.

Born in Jinnampo, South Pyongan Province in 1920, Park Rehyun studied ink-wash painting in Japan. After independence, while many painters were returning to the roots of Korean ink-wash painting in literati culture, Park rejected the principles of traditional ink-wash painting (which was reserved for male scholars) in order to pursue new directions based on Western modernism. Like Western feminist artists of the 20th century, she also incorporated handicraft techniques such as knitting, weaving, and dyeing into her art, and found the motifs and themes for her art from her own daily life.

Through her travels to different parts of the world, Park rediscovered the value of Eastern indigenous culture, inspiring her to produce Eastern abstract paintings that emphasized the subtle spread and permeation of ink in traditional Korean paper. Her paintings drew upon motifs from ancient cultures of Native America, Egypt, and other parts of Africa, as well as Korean folk art. As such, Park’s abstract paintings were understood as both Korean and international, depending on the viewers.

Park’s determined efforts to differentiate her works through sophisticated techniques and new technology eventually led her to study printmaking in the United States. From 1969 to 1973, she studied tapestry and printmaking in the US, mastering many complicated printmaking techniques that she boldly incorporated into her ink-wash paintings after returning to Korea. Her paintings, tapestries, and prints are all deeply connected to one another, often featuring forms (e.g., red circles and yellow bands) or materials (e.g., traditional black ink and paper) that reveal Park Rehyun’s identity as a woman and an Asian.

By illuminating the remarkable life and career of Park Rehyun, this exhibition seeks to free her from the shadow of her husband Kim Kichang, a giant of Korean modern art. During the turbulent period when Korean society was transitioning from colonial rule to independence, industrialization, and modernization, Park Rehyun established herself as a true pioneer and leader of Korean modern art, creating her own aesthetic language and directing the field of avant-garde painting.