×

Subscribe to our newsletter

Highlights From the Previous Week, Partnered Events and Haikus. View our Newsletter archive

Chun Kwang Young at Villa Empain

Renowned Korean artist Kwang-Young Chun is celebrated in a retrospective exhibition at the Boghossian Foundation’s Villa Empain until August 27.

Scroll right to read more ›
Text by Nadine Botha

“I think the thing I first saw was my mother’s face, and then there was mulberry paper. The paper is not just for writing and drawing, but is like the spirit and soul of Koreans,” artist Chun Kwang Young explains his signature assemblages made of triangles wrapped in mulberry paper. Known as hanji, the paper is made from the inner bark of the Paper Mulberry tree, indigenous to Korea’s rocky mountainsides. Since ancient times, the material has been used in everything from architecture and clothing to packaging and documentation because of its water-resistance, temperature regulation and resistance to decay.

A new retrospective exhibition by the Boghossian Foundation at Villa Empain in Brussels covers Chun’s work from 1989, when he was primarily a painter, to the mid-1990s when he started using the hanji parcels. It is his hanji assemblage wall hangings and sculptures created since 2004, when he started using a variety of tones to suggest depth and imagery, for which he has become best known.

This is the first solo exhibition presented by the Boghossian Foundation, which was established in 1992 to realise social and educational projects in Armenia, Belgium, Lebanon, and Switzerland. In 2010 the restored Villa Empain was opened as a space to foster art and dialogue between the East and West.

Chun Kwang Young, Aggregation 12-AP014, 2012
Chun Kwang Young, Aggregation 12-AP014, 2012
Chun Kwang Young, Aggregation15-JL038, 2015
Chun Kwang Young, Aggregation15-JL038, 2015
Chun Kwang Young, Aggregation17-FE018, 2017
Chun Kwang Young, Aggregation17-FE018, 2017
Chun Kwang Young, Aggregation16-JA010 (STAR2), 2016
Chun Kwang Young, Aggregation16-JA010 (STAR2), 2016
8819ef73-60bd-4841-9516-7e6686fa0df7
Chun Kwang Young, Aggregation 15-OC061, 2015
Chun Kwang Young, Aggregation 15-OC061, 2015
9abbb494-a232-47db-85e2-0495d3ca791c
6666a01a-e7aa-415c-92f5-4f7999aa097c
Back

Articles you also might like

La Patinoire Royale Bach, a contemporary gallery founded by Valérie Bach nearly 10-years ago, opens its 2024 season with an important exhibition of early works by seminal California Light & Space Artist, Lita Albuquerque. The exhibition, installed in the nave of the large gallery space, is on view through April 13th.

Spazio Nobile presents Good Luck! New Experiments, a group show of nine designers, at the 7th edition of COLLECTIBLE, at the Vanderborght Building in Brussels between March 7- March 10, 2024.

La Verrière – Fondation d’entreprise Hermès, presents “Emi e dames messeur”, a solo exhibition of work by Belgian artist Koenraad Dedobbeleer, that includes a mix of previous and new works as well as art from his own personal collection. The exhibition is on view through April 27, 2024.

From Sunday, January 28th to Sunday, February 4th, 2024, the 69th edition of BRAFA will take place at the Brussels Expo. Featuring 132 galleries from over 14 countries, the 2024 edition of the leading art fair is planning to be one of its best yet.