In mid-20th-century South Korea, amid the economic hardship and political repression that followed the Korean War, a vanguard of abstract artists forged a radical new visual language. Pushing back against rigid, state-sanctioned academic realism and breaking decisively from centuries of traditional fine-art ink painting, these artists sought an art form untethered from past conventions.
The Korean art critic Lee Yil curated a selection of their works into a groundbreaking group show at Tokyo Gallery in 1975; he coined the term Dansaekhwa in 1980 to define these nonfigurative works executed in understated, neutral hues.
Though the term translates to “monochrome painting,” the label is a misnomer. Dansaekhwa was never about the passive application of a single color. Rather than treating the canvas as a flat window for representation, these artists rejected Western compositional logic altogether, elevating process over final result and prioritizing physical labor as a form of spiritual meditation.
Through disciplined repetition—dragging gouges through wet paint, soaking and tearing traditional Hanji paper, or squeezing pigment through coarse hemp from behind, for example—they rendered the physical surface an arena of endurance and material transformation.
Over the past decade, a surge of international retrospectives, such as the 2015 “Dansaekhwa” exhibition at the 56th Venice Biennale (curated by art historian Yongwoo Lee) and major market interest, have cemented Dansaekhwa as one of modern art history’s vital movements. This November, Phaidon will publish Dansaekhwa: Korean Abstract Art and Its Cultural Impact as well.
As the international art world recalibrates following another bustling edition of Frieze Seoul, global attention remains fixed on South Korea’s rich modern art legacy. Driven by landmark gallery retrospectives and major international surveys, from Venice to San Francisco and Seoul, Dansaekhwa continues to stand out as the defining cornerstone of Korean abstraction.
Kwon Young-Woo
B. 1926, Riwon, Korea. D. 2013
Kwon Young-Woo was a Paris- and Seoul-based master who abandoned traditional ink brushes early in his career and worked with paper as a sculptural medium. Kwon used his fingers, fingernails, wooden tools, and scratch awls to tear, puncture, scratch, and layer multiple sheets of white hanji paper. His medium-to-large-scale monochromatic compositions feature rhythmic, torn incisions and subtle three-dimensional relief, occasionally accented by soft blurs of blue or dark ink seeping through from the reverse side. The resulting works resemble delicate, highly tactile topographies; the physical destruction of the paper becomes the generative act of creation.
Kwon forced a radical reevaluation of paper’s role in Korean and broader East Asian art history, bringing it into a modern context. His work was featured in the benchmark survey exhibition “Dansaekhwa” at the 56th Venice Biennale in 2015. Today, his tactile paper compositions are preserved in the permanent collections of major global institutions, including the MMCA in Seoul, the British Museum in London, and the Centre Pompidou in Paris.
Park Seo-Bo
B. 1931, Korea. D. 2023
Park Seo-Bo is recognized as the father of Dansaekhwa. He served as the movement’s theorist and organizing force, championing Korean art from his perch in Seoul until his passing. He is most famous for his lifelong “Écriture” series (1972–2023): In the 1980s, Park developed a technique of soaking sheets of traditional Hanji (mulberry paper) for weeks, layering it onto canvas, and pushing the wet pulp with his fingers, sticks, and rulers to build abstract, sculptural ridges, often referred to as Hanji “mountains.”
The artist’s early palette was restricted to unbleached white, inspired by the translucent purity of Korean Joseon porcelain, and deep matte black, recalling the soot lining traditional Korean kitchen hearths. Beginning in the early 2000s, Park introduced luminous hues drawn directly from nature, naming specific shades such as Maple Leaf Red, Canola Yellow, and Sky Gray.
Park saw this relentless, daily repetition as an exercise in self-erasure and spiritual healing for both the artist and the viewer. Seoul’s Kukje Gallery is currently celebrating his legacy with a retrospective that remains on view through October 18th. His footprint continues to expand with the recent opening of the Park Seo-Bo Memorial Museum in Seoul, alongside key acquisitions by prestigious institutions like Tate Modern in London, the Museum of Modern Art in New York, and the Centre Pompidou in Paris.
Ha Chong-Hyun
B. 1935, Korea.
Seoul-based master Ha Chong-Hyun has revolutionized the physical mechanics of canvas painting through his long-running “Conjunction” series. The artist eschews traditional front-facing brushwork, instead applying thick, muted oil paint in shades of taupe, dark ocher, rust brown, and charcoal to the back of coarse burlap or hemp fabric. Using significant physical force, he squeezes the viscous pigment forward through the open weave of the fabric until it oozes out the front, where he scrapes, smears, or shapes the paint using trowels and palette knives. The final works feature heavy, sculptural impasto trails protruding from rough, unpainted burlap.
Ha’s unconventional technique turned painting inside out, transforming coarse industrial sacking into a tactile battlefield. His work reached milestone prominence in 2022, when Kukje Art and Culture Foundation organized a solo show at Fondazione Bevilacqua La Masa as an official Collateral Event at the 59th Venice Biennale.
On September 25th, the artist will open a major presentation at the Asian Art Museum in San Francisco: his first-ever North American retrospective. His pieces form an integral part of major permanent collections around the world, including MoMA and the Guggenheim Museum in New York, as well as the Centre Pompidou in Paris.
Lee Ufan
B. 1936, Kyongnam, South Korea.
Lee Ufan is an internationally renowned painter, sculptor, and philosopher who splits his practice between Japan, France, and South Korea. Lee occupies a unique position in art history: while recognized as the key theoretical architect of Japan’s Mono-ha (School of Things) movement in the late 1960s, he simultaneously served as a vital international bridge for Dansaekhwa. Though scholars debate the artist’s exact categorization—his “Relatum” series of spare sculptures align with Mono-ha’s prioritization of physical, unmediated interactions between raw industrial materials and natural objects, while his rhythmic paintings share more with Dansaekhwa—Lee’s practice links both movements via a philosophical commitment to restraint and material dialogue.
To make his famous “From Point and From Line” series, Lee holds his breath for up to two minutes, synchronizing his body with his brushwork: His deliberate strokes of mineral pigment fade systematically across bare canvas.
Lee remains the most commercially successful living Korean artist, with benchmark works like East Winds (1984) achieving over 3.1 billion won ($2.7 million) at auction in 2021. His institutional footprint is secured by dedicated foundation spaces in Naoshima, Japan, Arles, France, and Busan, high-profile site-specific commissions at the Château de Versailles and the Hirshhorn Museum, and a retrospective organized by the Dia Art Foundation at SMAC Venice as an official Collateral Event of the 61st Venice Biennale this past year.
—Valentina Buzzi
