Exhibition of North Korean Art : Curated by Professor Muhn

Contemporary North Korean Art
June 18 – August 14, 2016

THE EVOLUTION OF SOCIALIST REALISM
June 18: 
5-    6 pm GALLERY TALK
6-    9 pm OPENING RECEPTION

American University Museum at the Katzen Arts Center 

Join Georgetown Professor, artist, and curator BG Muhn for a tour of two exhibitions of North and South Korean contemporary art and a discussion on the impact of culture on the artistic style of each republic. Meet and mingle with artists, curators and museum patrons at the Summer opening reception. Events are free and open to the public. 

ABOUT THE EXHIBITION:
Art is huge in North Korea. The forms and structure of contemporary North Korean art, a central and highly developed dimension of the national culture, are largely unknown to the outside world. Whether a true sense of art as understood in the West exists or not in North Korea has remained an open question for most people outside the DPRK. This exhibition, the first of its kind in the U.S., seeks to broaden understanding of North Korean art beyond stereotypes of propaganda and kitsch to show sophisticated and nuanced expressive achievements.  It investigates previously unrevealed evidence of North Korean artistic experimentation and that nation’s particular evolution of Socialist Realism within its own culturally homogeneous context. Special focus is given to the development of Chosonhwa, North Korea’s predominant painting medium revered as the nation’s most refined. Chosonhwa is a traditional Oriental ink-and-brush painting on rice paper that absorbed Socialist Realism influences in the 1950s and has since progressed to become its own distinct art form. Contemporary North Korean Art: The Evolution of Social Realism is curated by BG Muhn, an artist, and professor at Georgetown University. The exhibition is the culmination of five years of research, on-site studio visits to Mansudae Art Studio, the largest state-run studio in the world, in Pyongyang, and interviews with artists and art historians.

Full Poster here