[KS] Kim and Washington

[Frank Hoffmann]

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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