Lee ShinJa (b.1930) is a pioneering first-generation Korean fiber artist and educator, whose materials-centric practice interwove salvaged fibers, traditional embroidery thread, steel, and multidimensional abstraction. The artist’s long career as an artist, educator, and organizer persisted throughout the Korean War and Reconstruction, and has solidified her as one of the most influential artists of her generation. The artist was the subject of a recent retrospective at the National Museum of Modern and Contemporary Art in Korea, and stands as living testament that the canon of her generation of Asian artists expands beyond established, predominantly male movements such as Dansaekhwa and Mono-ha.

In the mid 1990s, Lee began dividing the surfaces of her works to create panels of independent vignettes in which figurative and non-figurative forms coexist, a stark contrast to her previous works where soft curves unite to create organic abstractions. In Spirit of Mountain, Lee captures the mountains of her hometown, Uljin, through dynamic geometric lines and delicate gradients.