KAIST opened a special exhibition of donated works by Hee-Young Yoo, a Korean master of color field abstraction and the current president of the National Academy of Arts, on September 4 at the Auditorium (E15). The exhibition featuring 14 of Yoo’s artworks is open to the public for free until August next year.
KAIST's relationship with Yoo dates back to 2002 when Mirae Corporation’s former CEO Chung Moon-soul donated his personal art collection to KAIST. Among the works donated was Resurrection, for which Yoo won the Presidential Award at the 23rd Korea Art Exhibition in 1974.
In August 2022, Yoo was also appointed as an Invited Distinguished Professor at the School of Digital Humanities and Computational Social Sciences. In October of the same year, he generously donated 20 of his works from the early 2000s to the late 2010s.
The works featured in the special exhibition are divided between the Yoo Hee Young Gallery on the first floor of the Auditorium and the lobby area on the first and second floors. The exhibition showcases the beauty of color field abstraction, which is characterized by the extreme tension of intense and perfect flat compositions and the nuanced differences in color.
"It is very meaningful for me to be able to share my donated works with the public at this special exhibition on campus to wish KAIST the best as it moves forward as a leading global university," said Yoo Hee-Young. "Viewing the work while thinking about the creative process that led to the convergence of the restrained composition into an expression of color will be a valuable experience for our students, who will once again be reminded of the great power of deep observation," commented Hyun Jung Seok, director of the KAIST Art Museum and overseer of the exhibition.
The exhibition is part of QAIST's new cultural strategy for the next 50 years. The QAIST strategy includes the opening of an art museum and the promotion of a campus gallery to expand scientific and artistic experiences.