KYU NAM HAN

A Synthesis of Opposites: Deconstruction/Reconstruction

The Origin of the Neo-Classical Deconstructivism

In an interview in 1987 with Eleanor Heartney, Kyu Nam Han talks:

"I live between two worlds. My concern is global."

When I am in Korea I interpret Korean Modernism within the Western cultural context and when I am in New York interpreted the western Modernism within Eastern cultural context.

I accept all the cultural value criteria and conventional methodologies as ‘perspective’, ‘chiaroscuro’ of the West and ‘passage’ ‘grid’ from the East.

I apply Eastern methods on the traditional western perspective painting. I apply calligraphic principles on the Western painting.

I recreate new images; new series of pictorial hieroglyphs.” I look at the nature in search for a series of hieroglyphic structural
form and its content. I read its structural relationships and its metaphoric contexts; its meaning variances and its metaphoric concepts: a synthesis of opposites;

(1) Figure/ ground; (2) image/ structure (3) signifier/signified (4) inside/outside (5) language/being (6) perspective/flatness together. These ambivalent elements are converging into one single totality. The ontological relativity and meaning variance become one. A sense of totality, Barthes called this “a chain of meaning”; Heidegger, “presence-a meaning of being”; for Husserl, it was “transcendental consciousness”; Unknown Korean Punchong potter it was “writing and painting”.

Painting to me is writing and writing (calligraphy) to me is painting.

In writing/ painting cityscapes and landscapes are the passages from Structuralism to post-Structuralisms and Neo-Classicism of the West and Neo-Classicism of Sung in China are the elements of starting point of views.

My approach to the issues of meaning and truth is the processed perceptions and premises in the fusing and operating of genetics of different cultures that depend upon the drawings and upon these a promiscuous variety of similar sources, from Wittigenstein to Heidegger.

Selected Solo Exhibitions

2003          Atelier International Art Group,
                   Inc., New York
                  The Korean Mission, New York
2002         Atelier International Art Group,
                  Inc., New York
2000         Michail Lombando Gallery, New
                  York
1999        Art Forum Gallery, New York
1998        Blue Hill Cultural Center
                 Ellen Kim Murphy Gallery, Seoul,
                 Korea
                 Old Church Cultural Center,
                 Demarest, NJ
1996        Mi Gallery, Seoul, Korea
1995        Hong Kong International Art
                 Exposition, Hong Kong
                 Walker Hill Art Center, Seoul,
                 Korea
1992       Yuna Gallery, Seoul, Korea
1991       Sun Gallery, Seoul, Korea
1990       Azart Gallery, Seattle WA
1988       Sun Gallery, Seoul, Korea
1984       John Harms Performing Center,
                 Englewood, New Jersey
1977       Hopkins Hall, Ohio State
                 University, Columbus, Ohio

Commissions

Collections

L.H. Funk Foundation, Basel Switzerland
American Express Headquarters, New York NY
Supreme Court, Seoul, Korea
Samsung Corporation, Seoul, Korea
Hoam Museum, Seoul, Korea
Han Sol Corporation, Seoul, Korea
Doo San Corporation, Seoul, Korea
Sun Kyung Corporation, Seoul, Korea
Commercial Bank of Korea, New York
Han IL Bank, Seoul, Korea
Sung San Corporation, Oregon WA
Tristar Corporation, Seoul, Korea
Gana Art, Seoul, Korea

Selected Private Collections
Lee Hak Collection, Seoul, Korea
Lee Ho Jae Collection, Seoul, Korea
Park Chung Myong Collection, New York
Rhim Jong B. Collection, New York
Lee Yong Soon Collection, Seoul, Korea
Lee Hoon Young Collection, Seoul, Korea
Scott Rodman Collection, New York

Selected Group Exhibitions

1999           Art Expo Colone, Koln, Germany
1997           Korean Cultural Service
                    Invitation, Paris, France
1996           Korean Cultural Service, New
                    York NY
1991           Blue Hill Cultural Center, Pearl
                    River NY
                   Contemporary Art of Korea,
                   Museum of Modern Art, Mexico
                   City, Mexico
1989          Gallery International 57, New
                    York
1986          Thorpe Int. Gallery, New York
                   Korea-New York’86 12 Artists
                    from Metropolitan Area,
                   Sparkill, NY
1984         Two Person Show, Ye Gallery,
                  Seoul, Korea
1983         Contemporary Korean Painting &
                   Pottery, Sarah Lawrence College,
                   Bronxville NY
                   Korean Painting & Pottery, Old
                   Church Cultural Center, Demarest
                    NJ
1978-’80   Two Person Exhibition, Hankook
                    Gallery NY
1978          National Invitational Exhibition
                    USA, New York
                   State University Gallery, New
                   Paltz, NY