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Legacy of Minjoong Art and ‘Post Minjoong Art’

Seewon Hyun 1

1한국예술종합학교

Accredited

ABSTRACT

This research places its purpose on examining the characteristics and meanings of th‘e Post Minjoong Art’ concept while mainly considering the relationship between the Arts and the reality that Minjoong Art suggested in 1980s. This research plans to state which influential relationship Minjoong Art, getting re-illuminated in Art History, has with the Arts during those times by studying for the first time the concept of‘ Post Minjoong Art’ which is gathering critical interest in Contemporary Art fields. Moreover, it will insist that ‘Post Minjoong Art’ has a dual attribute of extending the results of Minjoong Art while escaping its limitations. Minjoong Art was Realism Art that agonized over social communication and realistic participation which intended to find the direction of the Art Movement along with proper expression methods while emphasizing Realism. Following the 1st generation of Minjoong Art which emphasized‘ art as communication’ and the 2nd generation of Minjoong Art which emphasized political participation of the Arts, Minjoong Art at the late 1980s tried to show that the populace is the main body of political struggle through the reappearance of idealized laborers and farmers. Minjoong Art produced results as Realism Art in the context of intending to communicate with society while critically recognizing the reality of those days. However,portraying the populace as the typical masculine hero image of the late 1980s became the limitation of the Arts Movement in the context of styling the autonomy of the Arts and the problem awareness of the individual author. Within the introspection of Minjoong Art becoming rigid, it could not produce repercussions as great as that of overwhelming the influx of Postmodernism in the art worlds as well as the radical changes in Practical Politics even though it searched through breakthroughs such as ‘the 4th generation of Minjoong Art’ and th‘e New Arts Movement’. The relationship between the systems of Art and Minjoong Art in the 1990s became the essential factor in determining the direction of Minjoong Art afterwards. It shows the conversion of Minjoong Art which is located in a time when the will of political correspondence is sharply decreased within the reduction of the democratization movement while it also becomes the evidence for examining how criticism of the art system suggested by Minjoong Art during the passing times of the 1980s was possible. Especially, an alternative space appearing in 1999 called‘ Pool’ processed exhibitions and symposiums which recognized practical, critical problem suggestions while emphasizing the social communication and the capacity of criticism on art systems which were the results of Minjoong Art. Hereby, the correlation of the 1st generation of Minjoong Art which pursued the social communication will of artists rather than practical political participation is revealed. Meanwhile‘, Post Minjoong Art’ appearing in the Arts field after 2004 only named some contemporary artists showing sociopolitical consciousness while lacking sufficient discussion and contemplation. The concept of‘ Post Minjoong Art’ is a barometer which suggests in which changed aspects that influences from Minjoong Art are continued and investigates the conversion of the Episteme of Korean Modern Art. Contemporary artists showing differences according to effects such as Postmodernism or Conceptual Art,even while expanding the problem awareness between reality and the Arts suggested by Minjoong Art, can be seen as the specialty of ‘Post Minjoong Art’. Even though the major premise of political participation called Realism and the Populace which Minjoong Art emphasized in the 1980s disappeared, ‘Post Minjoong Art’hopes to actualize social communication with the Arts on the basis of reality recognition through popular culture and interest in others. If Minjoong artists concentrated on the populace in the context of struggling for the actual rights acquisition of subordinate classes such as famers and laborers, then the recognition of the artist’s self-identity as well as society’s others is the characteristic clearly appearing when reaching ‘Post Minjoong Art’times after Minjoong Art. Considerations on the following generation that experienced Minjoong Art in Korean Modern Art hold significant meaning in that it examines the relationship between the legacy and influence of Minjoong Art. Since ‘Post Minjoong Art’ here is neither a collective group movement such as Minjoong Art nor a trend of the Arts, it provides the essential evidence for scrupulously examining the operation methods and messages of each artist within the background of the contemporary art system. In other words, ‘Post MInjoong Art’ stimulates the central point of what Contemporary Realism Arts is in suggesting how the present day Arts can produce critical messages toward society.

Citation status

* References for papers published after 2023 are currently being built.