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| Kim and Washington [message #11133] |
Sun, 03 October 2010 21:36  |
Frank_Hoffmann
Messages: 245
Registered: May 2013
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Senior Member
Administrator |
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Dear George (and All):
Which of the Hicks paintings is this, the one you
posted? (The George Washington one I mean?)
...See an assembly of Hicks' various versions at
the END of this message.
"Washington, Crossing the Delaware" and
"Washington Passing the Delaware" were extremely
popular themes at the time, and until the late
19th century. There are many hundreds or
thousands of paintings, engravings, etchings, and
prints with that as a subject matter. Are you
referring to the subject matter or that
particular painting? The de Young Museum with its
amazing collection of 19th century American art
(recently rebuild as an upside-down trash can, a
charming piece of postmodern architecture) is
five minutes from where my wife and I live. And
if we'd stroll over there for a Sunday afternoon
visit, we would probably bump into a couple of
those, eyes closed. The painting you posted is
one of the better known ones of those "Washington
Crossing the Delaware" ones, by painter Edward
Hicks (1870-1849), a Quaker minister and folk
painter from Pennsylvania. But which version? Not
that it is important ... well, then again, the
fact that there are numerous versions IS
important in the context you presented it to us!
The more famous ones of these paintings were then
copied into other media by less famous artists.
There was a whole industry there to reproduce
such works. See FOR EXAMPLE George S. Lang's
"Washington Passing the Delaware":
http://www.americaslibrary.gov/aa/wash/aa_wash_soldier_2_e.h tml
--> Washington passing the Delaware, evening previous
to the Battle of Trenton, Dec. 25th, 1776
You can buy that George S. Lang version as a reproduction at Amazon.com:
http://www.amazon.com/Washington-passing-Delaware-Reprint-me asured/dp/B001FYR78I
They probably have the Kim & Kim portrait as
well, if you rather go for that one, maybe even
for Kindle.
Like all 19th century American painters, his
style closely resembles British late 18th and
19th century academic painting (that of some
other painters more resembles French
painting--many of the painters of the times were
first generation immigrants anyway--such as
Hubert Vos, whose portrait of King Kojong you
will have seen). Pretty much all of the
seascapes, for example, that you see in the de
Young, look all very British (I would probably
not know they aren't without the identifying
labels).
The Hicks piece you posted--and all others by
Hicks--are interesting because they show some
American local identity (vs. their British and
French prototypes), if you want to call it that.
In spite of the European stylistic adaptations
(e.g. of Napoleon in battle depictions), this is
after all "folk art," this is done by some local
minister, not by court artist or professional
artist. Here is a nice large online image of
Hick's 1849 version at the Chrysler Museum of Art:
http://www.chrysler.org/education/unit1/hicks2.htm
Larger image:
http://www.chrysler.org/education/unit1/unit1_images/hicks_w ashington.77.1271.jpg
The way Hicks uses colors and many other details
(e.g. the depiction of the horse movements and
how he deals with large spaces like the sky etc.)
shows that he was not a trained academic artist.
What is so interesting is that you are comparing
THIS (that is, one of Hicks' versions of
"Washington Passing the Delaware" paintings) to
the North Korean Kim & wife & little Kim
painting. That really totally got me! There are
countless 18th and 19th century 'emperor on
horseback' paintings, with brown and white horses
from Europe and the U.S. Why this painting? There
is not even any "son" there, and certainly not
his wife (as in the Kim & Kim painting). It is
not a battle either; it is the "three generals'"
happy family outing at their very own private
revolutionary site (Paektu-san). The oil
painting's title is "Sunrise at Paektu" (painter
Ch'oe Ha-t'aek; published in Chosôn misul
nyôn'gam 1991, p. 70; your posted version cuts
about 1/4 from the right and from the left). In
the Hicks painting there is no visual union of
father and son, as in the painting by
Ch'oe--father is riding while son points. Rather,
in Hicks shows some officer or general pointing,
but he is riding another horse. There is no
family there. And in a European or American
battle depiction one would not exactly expect
that. I think the reason you feel that these two
paintings can be compared, please correct me if I
am wrong, is mostly because of the use of colors
and the simplified formal rendering of space:
American folk painting is the keyword here.
Although one and a half centuries apart from the
North Korean painting, it seems to resemble how
the North Korean painter used colors and how he
dealt with space and backgrounds (or the other
way around). It is the 'folky' part that you
point to. And as such you are basically making
Ch'oe Ha-t'aek a great compliment, as this is
exactly the effect he wanted to create here.
Looking at North Korean oil paintings from the
1945-1950 period you will find that painters
simply continued their colonial-period styles.
And there are plenty of wonderful examples there
(e.g. Yi K'wae-dae, 1913-1965) how European 19th
century academic styles lived on, with a red flag
here and there. But not in 1991, in 1991 you
won't find any of this anymore. What seems
European or American history painting isn't
really. From the mid- or late 1960s you see more
and more brush and ink painting done the new
Chosônhwa style. And the Chosônhwa style is again
loaning (in every technical aspect I can see)
from late colonial Nihonga (which was then also a
tool for propaganda). At this point I might add
the same sentence Hyung Il Pai did in her
posting: I want to state that this is only my
personal opinion and does not reflect the main
stream accounts of the development and
appreciation of Korean arts. (Not that of South
Korean scholars either). This seems like a
controversial and/or provoking observation only
if you look at this from within the same kimchi
pot. Loaning from and building upon--and reacting
to--existing earlier styles and techniques is
otherwise what art AND art history is all about,
and it does not at all indicate any sort of
devaluation of the art work to point at such
relations. In any case, to continue, Chosônhwa
painting had then a strong influence on what
happened to oil painting in North Korea. So, by
the early 1970s oil painting, the showed many of
the same traits Chosônhwa did: bright colors,
simple often monochrome treatments of backgrounds
etc., showing happy smiling people. By the late
1980s and in the 1990s we see this style
completely prevailing over all other styles: oil
painting (and other techniques, e.g. acrylic
painting) had basically adapted Chosônhwa
techniques. You now have a hard time seeing what
is brush and ink painting (Chosônhwa) and what is
an oil painting, an acrylic, or a painting done
in e.g. air brush technique--it all looks like
Chosônhwa.
In that technical sense North Koreans have
succeeded to create a new style (even though
mostly build upon Nihonga as a starting point).
What you present there in your comparison of
Edward Hicks' Washington on horseback depiction
with Ch'oe Ha-t'aek Kim family on horeseback
painting is therefore more of a coincidental
similarity. As far as the technique goes,
historically this does not relate (North Koreans
did not get that from U.S. paintings); it appears
similar because of the folk art aspect in Hicks'
painting and the adaptation of Chosônhwa
techniques and aesthetics in North Korean oil
painting--the outcome has many similarities. We
would then be left with the subject matter, but
here I see more differences than similarities.
However, there are other such North Korean battle
scenes that involve horses, and in some of them
we find more similarities, but then more to
general 19th century academic painting traditions
(of depicting battle scenes).
Just noticed I have not discussed the variety of
versions and how this relates to NK ... will do
another time.
Best regards,
Frank
--
--------------------------------------
Frank Hoffmann
http://koreaweb.ws
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Attachment: E_Hicks.jpg
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| Re: Kim and Washington [message #11135 is a reply to message #11133] |
Mon, 04 October 2010 09:29  |
Georgy Katsiaficas
Messages: 34
Registered: April 2006
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Member |
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Frank and all,
The painting is not by Hicks, but by Thomas Sully, and was painted shortly
after the British burned down much of Washington DC. The Korean piece was
scanned from last week's Economist magazine as part of a cutely titled
article, "Next of Kim."
Here is the MFA's description of the Sully piece: The Passage of the
Delaware. 1819. By Thomas Sully, American (born in England), 17831872
372.11 x 525.78 cm (146 1/2 x 207 in.). Oil on canvas.
"The Passage of the Delaware was commissioned by the state of North Carolina
for the Senate Hall of the State House in Raleigh. ...Sully's painting was
never hung in the State House. Although Sully had corresponded with the
North Carolina governor regarding the dimensions of his canvas, he had
already begun painting by the time he received a reply. The final
composition was too large to fit in any of the spaces of the Senate Hall.
Instead, shortly after its completion, the artist sold the painting to John
Doggett, a Boston frame maker who also exhibited pictures. It was purchased
from Doggett before 1841 by the Boston Museum-no relation to the Museum of
Fine Arts, but rather a theater with a picture gallery located on Tremont
Street-where it remained until 1903, when the owners gave it to the
MFA."--http://www.mfa.org/collections/search_art.asp?recview =true&id=31231
"This text was adapted from Davis, et al., MFA Highlights: American Painting
(Boston, 2003)."
Museum of Fine Arts, Boston.
I might add that the image is in the public domain because its copyright has
expired under provisions that apply to the United States, Australia, the
European Union and those countries with a copyright term of life of the
author plus 70 years.
I teach about half my classes (world civilizations before 1500) in the MFA
and also take my Asian social movements class there at least a few times to
orient them in the culture and history of Asia and to glimpse the varying
aesthetic expression of cultural differences among its people. Jane Portal,
the new MFA curator of the Korean room, recently told me she hopes to
reinstall the collection, which she called one of the finest in the US.
I look forward to the opening of the MFA's new American wing next month,
although their collection is so extensive, I am not sure the Sully piece
will be up. I suspect they will include a different monumental canvas (see
below), by Gilbert Stuart (the same artist whose imagery graces the one
dollar bill). ³Washington at Dorchester Heights² presents a slightly
different juxtaposition of the horse and the president.
Cheers,
George
> From: Frank Hoffmann
> Reply-To: Korean Studies Discussion List
> Date: Sun, 3 Oct 2010 18:36:16 -0700
> To:
> Subject: [KS] Kim and Washington
>
> Dear George (and All):
>
> Which of the Hicks paintings is this, the one you
> posted? (The George Washington one I mean?)
> ...See an assembly of Hicks' various versions at
> the END of this message.
>
> "Washington, Crossing the Delaware" and
> "Washington Passing the Delaware" were extremely
> popular themes at the time, and until the late
> 19th century. There are many hundreds or
> thousands of paintings, engravings, etchings, and
> prints with that as a subject matter. Are you
> referring to the subject matter or that
> particular painting? The de Young Museum with its
> amazing collection of 19th century American art
> (recently rebuild as an upside-down trash can, a
> charming piece of postmodern architecture) is
> five minutes from where my wife and I live. And
> if we'd stroll over there for a Sunday afternoon
> visit, we would probably bump into a couple of
> those, eyes closed. The painting you posted is
> one of the better known ones of those "Washington
> Crossing the Delaware" ones, by painter Edward
> Hicks (1870-1849), a Quaker minister and folk
> painter from Pennsylvania. But which version? Not
> that it is important ... well, then again, the
> fact that there are numerous versions IS
> important in the context you presented it to us!
>
> The more famous ones of these paintings were then
> copied into other media by less famous artists.
> There was a whole industry there to reproduce
> such works. See FOR EXAMPLE George S. Lang's
> "Washington Passing the Delaware":
> http://www.americaslibrary.gov/aa/wash/aa_wash_soldier_2_e.h tml
> --> Washington passing the Delaware, evening previous
> to the Battle of Trenton, Dec. 25th, 1776
> You can buy that George S. Lang version as a reproduction at Amazon.com:
> http://www.amazon.com/Washington-passing-Delaware-Reprint-me asured/dp/B001FYR7
> 8I
> They probably have the Kim & Kim portrait as
> well, if you rather go for that one, maybe even
> for Kindle.
>
> Like all 19th century American painters, his
> style closely resembles British late 18th and
> 19th century academic painting (that of some
> other painters more resembles French
> painting--many of the painters of the times were
> first generation immigrants anyway--such as
> Hubert Vos, whose portrait of King Kojong you
> will have seen). Pretty much all of the
> seascapes, for example, that you see in the de
> Young, look all very British (I would probably
> not know they aren't without the identifying
> labels).
>
> The Hicks piece you posted--and all others by
> Hicks--are interesting because they show some
> American local identity (vs. their British and
> French prototypes), if you want to call it that.
> In spite of the European stylistic adaptations
> (e.g. of Napoleon in battle depictions), this is
> after all "folk art," this is done by some local
> minister, not by court artist or professional
> artist. Here is a nice large online image of
> Hick's 1849 version at the Chrysler Museum of Art:
> http://www.chrysler.org/education/unit1/hicks2.htm
> Larger image:
> http://www.chrysler.org/education/unit1/unit1_images/hicks_w ashington.77.1271.
> jpg
> The way Hicks uses colors and many other details
> (e.g. the depiction of the horse movements and
> how he deals with large spaces like the sky etc.)
> shows that he was not a trained academic artist.
>
> What is so interesting is that you are comparing
> THIS (that is, one of Hicks' versions of
> "Washington Passing the Delaware" paintings) to
> the North Korean Kim & wife & little Kim
> painting. That really totally got me! There are
> countless 18th and 19th century 'emperor on
> horseback' paintings, with brown and white horses
> from Europe and the U.S. Why this painting? There
> is not even any "son" there, and certainly not
> his wife (as in the Kim & Kim painting). It is
> not a battle either; it is the "three generals'"
> happy family outing at their very own private
> revolutionary site (Paektu-san). The oil
> painting's title is "Sunrise at Paektu" (painter
> Ch'oe Ha-t'aek; published in Chosôn misul
> nyôn'gam 1991, p. 70; your posted version cuts
> about 1/4 from the right and from the left). In
> the Hicks painting there is no visual union of
> father and son, as in the painting by
> Ch'oe--father is riding while son points. Rather,
> in Hicks shows some officer or general pointing,
> but he is riding another horse. There is no
> family there. And in a European or American
> battle depiction one would not exactly expect
> that. I think the reason you feel that these two
> paintings can be compared, please correct me if I
> am wrong, is mostly because of the use of colors
> and the simplified formal rendering of space:
> American folk painting is the keyword here.
> Although one and a half centuries apart from the
> North Korean painting, it seems to resemble how
> the North Korean painter used colors and how he
> dealt with space and backgrounds (or the other
> way around). It is the 'folky' part that you
> point to. And as such you are basically making
> Ch'oe Ha-t'aek a great compliment, as this is
> exactly the effect he wanted to create here.
>
> Looking at North Korean oil paintings from the
> 1945-1950 period you will find that painters
> simply continued their colonial-period styles.
> And there are plenty of wonderful examples there
> (e.g. Yi K'wae-dae, 1913-1965) how European 19th
> century academic styles lived on, with a red flag
> here and there. But not in 1991, in 1991 you
> won't find any of this anymore. What seems
> European or American history painting isn't
> really. From the mid- or late 1960s you see more
> and more brush and ink painting done the new
> Chosônhwa style. And the Chosônhwa style is again
> loaning (in every technical aspect I can see)
> from late colonial Nihonga (which was then also a
> tool for propaganda). At this point I might add
> the same sentence Hyung Il Pai did in her
> posting: I want to state that this is only my
> personal opinion and does not reflect the main
> stream accounts of the development and
> appreciation of Korean arts. (Not that of South
> Korean scholars either). This seems like a
> controversial and/or provoking observation only
> if you look at this from within the same kimchi
> pot. Loaning from and building upon--and reacting
> to--existing earlier styles and techniques is
> otherwise what art AND art history is all about,
> and it does not at all indicate any sort of
> devaluation of the art work to point at such
> relations. In any case, to continue, Chosônhwa
> painting had then a strong influence on what
> happened to oil painting in North Korea. So, by
> the early 1970s oil painting, the showed many of
> the same traits Chosônhwa did: bright colors,
> simple often monochrome treatments of backgrounds
> etc., showing happy smiling people. By the late
> 1980s and in the 1990s we see this style
> completely prevailing over all other styles: oil
> painting (and other techniques, e.g. acrylic
> painting) had basically adapted Chosônhwa
> techniques. You now have a hard time seeing what
> is brush and ink painting (Chosônhwa) and what is
> an oil painting, an acrylic, or a painting done
> in e.g. air brush technique--it all looks like
> Chosônhwa.
> In that technical sense North Koreans have
> succeeded to create a new style (even though
> mostly build upon Nihonga as a starting point).
> What you present there in your comparison of
> Edward Hicks' Washington on horseback depiction
> with Ch'oe Ha-t'aek Kim family on horeseback
> painting is therefore more of a coincidental
> similarity. As far as the technique goes,
> historically this does not relate (North Koreans
> did not get that from U.S. paintings); it appears
> similar because of the folk art aspect in Hicks'
> painting and the adaptation of Chosônhwa
> techniques and aesthetics in North Korean oil
> painting--the outcome has many similarities. We
> would then be left with the subject matter, but
> here I see more differences than similarities.
> However, there are other such North Korean battle
> scenes that involve horses, and in some of them
> we find more similarities, but then more to
> general 19th century academic painting traditions
> (of depicting battle scenes).
>
> Just noticed I have not discussed the variety of
> versions and how this relates to NK ... will do
> another time.
>
> Best regards,
> Frank
>
>
>
>
> --
> --------------------------------------
> Frank Hoffmann
> http://koreaweb.ws
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| Re: Kim and Washington [message #11136 is a reply to message #11135] |
Mon, 04 October 2010 15:25 |
Frank_Hoffmann
Messages: 245
Registered: May 2013
|
Senior Member
Administrator |
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|
Thanks George. In the first 'quick draft' of my
last email to the list I had included a joking
remark that Jane Portal could then hang Sully's
Washington battle scene together with the Kim &
Kim painting, just the way you presented them.
(We met in Vienna last month.) *But* I then
"corrected" myself as I thought what was the
'famous' Sully piece at the MFA was the one
entitled "Washington Crossing the Delaware" --
see here, about 2/3 down the page:
http://www.artexpertswebsite.com/pages/artists/sully.php
------ q u o t e (from above URL) ------
Sully was commissioned to create a full length
portrait of George Washington and instead,
painted a massive historical scene of Washington
crossing the Delaware. This is considered to be
his most famous painting, though at the time, it
cost Sully a great deal of frustration and
expense. The patron that originally commissioned
this piece from him found it too large and Sully
was left with this massive composition and no one
to buy it. This painting is now housed at the
Museum of Fine arts in Boston.
------------------------------------
Now, looking at the MFA website link you just
provided, this above website obviously puts the
wrong image for the text that goes with it! The
more famous Sully painting was obviously "The
Passage of the Delaware" (as mentioned in the
description). I thus ended up thinking it must be
one of the many Hicks paintings that you had
posted. Furthermore, the small size of the posted
image did not allow for much of an analysis --
that's why I referred to the large online image
(of another Hicks version) when talking about the
treatment of colors and background.
Taken all together, this certainly devaluates my
references to folk art all together (IN THAT
COMPARISON). Yet, it does not put any weight onto
the comparison of the two paintings (Sully's and
the North Korean) in itself. From an art
historical point of view these are stylistically
far apart, and also far apart (as I tried to
explain) from the point of historical development
... that is, how the North Korean painters ended
up with that kind of image. It may well work for
a popular magazine like the Economist to present
such a comparison (but looking this up, the
magazine did not do that), and I can understand
that many people might "go for it" -- but it is
not a serious approach, it is not an art
historical analysis, just mockery. Was it meant
that way? It only works *to some degree* by
blending out many other facts and circumstances.
However, some time in the 1990s, as I mentioned
in another private email to you, I saw a similar
piece in one of the South Korean art magazines
(maybe Wôlgan misul or Kana at'û -- it would take
me too long to locate that now), where the very
same North Korean painting had also been compared
to a historical battle scene painting, either one
showing Napoleon or also Washington. Comparing
paintings that are 170 years apart only goes so
far ... that is, not very far. EVEN THOUGH we
talk about North Korea, and everyone and their
grandma seem to feel the urge to be more flashy
than North Korean propaganda itself, this is not
helpful in understanding North Korean art--and
thereby understanding what kind of developments
went on in North Korea, and how all the various
pieces relate to each other. I personally would
prefer to make the joke or ironic remark AFTER
having tried to do a serious analysis, not to
start an analysis. But this is just me. Yet, I
hope at least those in Korean Studies would agree.
Best wishes,
Frank
Post Scriptum:
Photoshop always does the job to get the message
out far more brilliant, no need to bother with
art history then :)
--
--------------------------------------
Frank Hoffmann
http://koreaweb.ws
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| Nancy Abelmann at UCSD (10/11 5-6:30 PM) [message #11142 is a reply to message #11135] |
Wed, 06 October 2010 16:58 |
Todd Henry
Messages: 15
Registered: December 2003
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Junior Member |
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Can you please post the following announcement about the innaugural speaker for our new Korean studies series in the arts and humanities at UCSD. A flyer is also attached for further dissemination.
Thanks,
Todd A. Henry
UCSD Department of History
Nancy Abelmann
“Reflections on The Intimate University: Korean American Students and the Problem of Segregation”
Monday, October 11, 2010 5:00-6:30 pm. Literature Building Room 155 (deCerteau)
Nancy Abelmann will introduce the primary argument in The Intimate University (Duke University Press, 2009) about the ways in which Korean American students navigated the burden of racial stereotypes, foremost their image as instrumental strivers, as they managed their college lives. For many this meant working hard to appear to be anything but students motivated only be material rewards – an effort that characterized social life both in and beyond the popular largely Korean American student church. Deeply motivated to realize liberal ideals, many Korean American students were dogged by the realities of their often quite uniformly Korean American social lives. Nancy Abelmann will illustrate these arguments with her own favorite ethnographic vignettes from the book. She will also briefly discuss some the responses to the book, particularly from undergraduates. In the second part of the talk, she will turn to new research on the rapid increase of South Korean and PRC citizen undergraduates at the University of Illinois, nearing 10% of the student body, and likely to soon outnumber Asian Americans. Nancy Abelmann will reconsider her arguments in The Intimate University about liberal attachments in the light of the neoliberalization of higher education globally, asking what challenges international undergraduate student poses to our universities and times.
Nancy Abelmann is the inaugural speaker for this year’s Korean Studies Speaker Series, entitled, “Modern (Sub-)Empires and Transnational Korea.” She is Associate Vice Chancellor for Research and the Harry E. Preble Professor of Anthropology, Asian American Studies, East Asian Languages and Cultures, and Gender & Women’s Studies at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. She co-directs the Ethnography of the University Initiative and served as the director of the Center for East Asian and Pacific Studies from 2005-2008. She has published books on social movements in contemporary South Korea; women and social mobility in post-colonial South Korea; Korean America; and South Korean film. She is a co-editor of forthcoming No Alternative? Experiments in South Korean Education (Berkeley: Global, Area and International Archive, University of California Press, 2011).
The lecture series is sponsored by a grant from the Office of the Dean, the Division of Arts and Humanities and additional support from the Korea-Pacific Program, IR/PS.
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| Re: Kim and Washington [message #11146 is a reply to message #11136] |
Thu, 07 October 2010 06:16 |
Georgy Katsiaficas
Messages: 34
Registered: April 2006
|
Member |
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Dear Frank,
The painting you posted, "Washington Crossing the Delaware," is by George
Caleb Bingham, not Sully, and belongs to the collection of the Chrysler
Museum in Norfolk, Virginia--not Boston's MFA.
Bingham's piece is quite different than Sully's ("The Passage of the
Delaware)". In the latter, the juxtaposition of the horse and rider against
the landscape below as well as the waving hand of the "father's" nearby
companion are salient aspects of its formal similarity to the Korean piece
and are not shared by Bingham's portrayal.
George
> From: Frank Hoffmann
> Reply-To: Korean Studies Discussion List
> Date: Mon, 4 Oct 2010 12:25:54 -0700
> To:
> Subject: Re: [KS] Kim and Washington
>
> Thanks George. In the first 'quick draft' of my
> last email to the list I had included a joking
> remark that Jane Portal could then hang Sully's
> Washington battle scene together with the Kim &
> Kim painting, just the way you presented them.
> (We met in Vienna last month.) *But* I then
> "corrected" myself as I thought what was the
> 'famous' Sully piece at the MFA was the one
> entitled "Washington Crossing the Delaware" --
> see here, about 2/3 down the page:
> http://www.artexpertswebsite.com/pages/artists/sully.php
>
> ------ q u o t e (from above URL) ------
> Sully was commissioned to create a full length
> portrait of George Washington and instead,
> painted a massive historical scene of Washington
> crossing the Delaware. This is considered to be
> his most famous painting, though at the time, it
> cost Sully a great deal of frustration and
> expense. The patron that originally commissioned
> this piece from him found it too large and Sully
> was left with this massive composition and no one
> to buy it. This painting is now housed at the
> Museum of Fine arts in Boston.
>
>
> ------------------------------------
>
> Now, looking at the MFA website link you just
> provided, this above website obviously puts the
> wrong image for the text that goes with it! The
> more famous Sully painting was obviously "The
> Passage of the Delaware" (as mentioned in the
> description). I thus ended up thinking it must be
> one of the many Hicks paintings that you had
> posted. Furthermore, the small size of the posted
> image did not allow for much of an analysis --
> that's why I referred to the large online image
> (of another Hicks version) when talking about the
> treatment of colors and background.
>
> Taken all together, this certainly devaluates my
> references to folk art all together (IN THAT
> COMPARISON). Yet, it does not put any weight onto
> the comparison of the two paintings (Sully's and
> the North Korean) in itself. From an art
> historical point of view these are stylistically
> far apart, and also far apart (as I tried to
> explain) from the point of historical development
> ... that is, how the North Korean painters ended
> up with that kind of image. It may well work for
> a popular magazine like the Economist to present
> such a comparison (but looking this up, the
> magazine did not do that), and I can understand
> that many people might "go for it" -- but it is
> not a serious approach, it is not an art
> historical analysis, just mockery. Was it meant
> that way? It only works *to some degree* by
> blending out many other facts and circumstances.
> However, some time in the 1990s, as I mentioned
> in another private email to you, I saw a similar
> piece in one of the South Korean art magazines
> (maybe Wôlgan misul or Kana at'û -- it would take
> me too long to locate that now), where the very
> same North Korean painting had also been compared
> to a historical battle scene painting, either one
> showing Napoleon or also Washington. Comparing
> paintings that are 170 years apart only goes so
> far ... that is, not very far. EVEN THOUGH we
> talk about North Korea, and everyone and their
> grandma seem to feel the urge to be more flashy
> than North Korean propaganda itself, this is not
> helpful in understanding North Korean art--and
> thereby understanding what kind of developments
> went on in North Korea, and how all the various
> pieces relate to each other. I personally would
> prefer to make the joke or ironic remark AFTER
> having tried to do a serious analysis, not to
> start an analysis. But this is just me. Yet, I
> hope at least those in Korean Studies would agree.
>
> Best wishes,
> Frank
>
> Post Scriptum:
> Photoshop always does the job to get the message
> out far more brilliant, no need to bother with
> art history then :)
>
>
>
>
>
> --
> --------------------------------------
> Frank Hoffmann
> http://koreaweb.ws
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| Re: Kim and Washington [message #11149 is a reply to message #11146] |
Fri, 08 October 2010 13:12 |
Frank_Hoffmann
Messages: 245
Registered: May 2013
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Senior Member
Administrator |
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Dear George, dear List:
George, your posting below greatly confuses me ... as it is
completely irrelevant to the discussion we had, and because I did
never in any way discuss the image you mention AT ALL.
1.
In my first response to your posting of the two then unidentified
images that you posted I was referring to Edward Hicks (1870-1849)
and I re-posted your image and 4 others by Hicks in that response ...
image in the List Archives here:
http://koreaweb.ws/pipermail/koreanstudies_koreaweb.ws/attac hments/20101003/7ba0d23c/attachment-0001.jpg
I referred to yet another Hicks version at the Chrysler Museum,
simply because the ONLINE version was nicely large, so one would be
able to actually discuss it:
http://www.chrysler.org/education/unit1/unit1_images/hicks_w ashington.77.1271.jpg
To repeat and summarize, in that first response I made my point by
arguing that it makes little sense (from an art historical point of
view) to compare paintings 150 or so years apart, and to base such a
comparison of such a general subject matter as "leaders on horses"
(all the details did differ, e.g. no battle scene in the Kim & Kim
painting, no family in the Washington battle scene, etc.). I pointed
out that the ONLY similarity, execpt for the "leader on horse" theme,
might be the treatment of colors and backgrounds between Kim & Kim
painting and the Hicks painting, but also pointed out a little about
the history of how the North Korean artists ended up with that.
2.
In my second mail I agreed with you that I had wrongly assumed your
posted (more famous) painting was one of the many Hicks
reinterpretations. It was by Sully himself, indeed. And I did EXPLAIN
why I ended up with that mixup.
I did at no point discuss the painting in my 2nd posting -- that was
a quote from the website given in that posting, and was ONLY put
there as an explanation of the mentioned confusion of attribution to
Hicks. I understand this is confusing, but please re-read more
carefully and you see what I mean.
3. The issue as regards to attribution to Hicks / Sully / Bingham
does in no way whatsoever make a difference for the general
statements as regards to comparing 150 or 170 years apart paintings
from Korea and the U.S.
So far as a further clarification.
Best regards,
Frank
>Dear Frank,
>
>The painting you posted, "Washington Crossing the Delaware," is by George
>Caleb Bingham, not Sully, and belongs to the collection of the Chrysler
>Museum in Norfolk, Virginia--not Boston's MFA.
>
>Bingham's piece is quite different than Sully's ("The Passage of the
>Delaware)". In the latter, the juxtaposition of the horse and rider against
>the landscape below as well as the waving hand of the "father's" nearby
>companion are salient aspects of its formal similarity to the Korean piece
>and are not shared by Bingham's portrayal.
>
>George
--
--------------------------------------
Frank Hoffmann
http://koreaweb.ws
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