Bamboo in Wind
Maker
Gim Gyu-jin (金圭鎭)
(Korean, 1868 - 1933)
Daten.d.
MediumHanging scroll, brush and ink on paper
DimensionsPanel: 43 9/16 × 11 1/4 in. (110.6 × 28.6 cm)
Mounting: 69 1/2 × 15 3/4 in. (176.5 × 40 cm)
Mounting: 69 1/2 × 15 3/4 in. (176.5 × 40 cm)
Credit LineGift of C.A. Islinger
Object number2004.97
Status
Not on viewActive at the end of the 19th and beginning of the 20th century, Kim Gyu-jin was one of the most famous Korean scholar-painters of the late Joseon dynasty (1392–1910) and the early Colonial Period when Japan governed Korea (1910–1945). Kim excelled in several genres of painting, including colorful figural and decorative court subjects, as well as calligraphy, but he is renowned for his monochrome paintings of orchids and especially for bamboo rendered in nuanced shades of black ink. Kim’s works were so esteemed at the time that he taught painting and calligraphy to the son of one of the last Joseon rulers, King Gojong (who ruled 1863–1907). Adopting Western practice, Kim set up a photography shop in the capital city of Seoul. Despite this enthusiasm for foreign technology, Kim remained conservative in his own ink-painting style, in which he pursued the aesthetics of Chinese amateur-scholar painting (which he had studied during an eight-year sojourn in China). This hanging scroll, executed in stark black ink on white paper, is an especially energetic example of his preferred subject. The two wind-tossed bamboo stalks vividly capture the traditional association in East Asian symbolism of the bamboo with loyalty and endurance because of the plant’s ability to bend in natural adversity without yielding and breaking.
Yi Mae Kye (Ri Baikei)
panel n.d., mount before mid- 1770s
