[In-Depth Look] The Season When Persimmons Ripen

Director Kim Bora

Not long ago, I visited Anjwa-do in Sinan-gun, Jeollanam-do, the hometown of Suhwa (樹話) Kim Hwan-ki (1913?1974). There, Kim Hwan-ki's old house still stands. Kim Hwan-ki has become the artist of the most expensive works today. Yet, as if indifferent to this, the old house that was his root exudes an aura of sublime elegance (雲上氣稟).

This place is a tiled house built by his father right in front of the house where Kim Hwan-ki was born at the age of seven. The main building (Anchae) is preserved in its original form. It is the space where Kim Hwan-ki spent his childhood. To the right of the Anchae is an annex built in the 1940s. This was the studio Kim used when he came down during school vacations while studying in Seoul. Originally, it was a thatched-roof house with a spacious wooden-floored studio. However, it has now been remodeled into a separate residence divided by a fence.

I sat on the wooden floor and looked out at the wide yard where young Kim Hwan-ki must have played and the open landscape stretching beyond it. It seemed to reveal the portrait of a young artist who dreamed of becoming a writer before becoming a painter. Kim Hwan-ki loved writing. He was a literary figure who left poems and essays not only in diaries and letters but also in literary magazines and newspapers such as Sincheonji and Hyundae Gongron. As I recalled Kim Hwan-ki’s words and immersed myself in the atmosphere, a persimmon tree caught my eye.

In Seongbuk-dong, there is a house site that holds the connection between Geunwon Kim Yong-jun and Kim Hwan-ki. The house is called Noshisanbang (老枾山房). The novelist Lee Tae-jun named it after the old persimmon tree in the house. Noshisanbang was originally Kim Yong-jun’s residence, but he, who cherished Kim Hwan-ki, sold it cheaply to him as a wedding gift. Although for a short period, Kim Hwan-ki spent his newlywed days here.

Kim Yong-jun, a painter, critic, and essayist, often mentioned Kim Hwan-ki in his writings. "Noshisanbang, connected by a shared vision, rekindled the artistic spirit that had been dormant, and from there, it is a joy above all to have gained an artist whom modern times cannot produce."

In Kim Yong-jun’s essay Yukjang Huggi, his feelings toward Kim Hwan-ki are clearly expressed. He also captured Kim Hwan-ki’s image on canvas. The painting of Kim Hwan-ki and his wife Kim Hyang-an standing with the thick persimmon tree laden with fruit in Noshisanbang is impressive. Although Noshisanbang has disappeared, two old persimmon trees that hold such memories still stand there as if they were two artists themselves.

The old persimmon tree I met at Kim Hwan-ki’s birthplace seemed to become a symbol for me. Did not the German philosopher Arthur Schopenhauer (1788?1860) point out the importance of understanding the original meaning of intuitive representation? The forms we encounter in unfamiliar places enter our hearts because there is surely an invisible link of imagery connecting them.

Kim Hwan-ki included trees in his pen name 'Suhwa (樹話)'. He said he simply liked trees and that there was no deeper meaning. However, having grown up looking at green mountains and the sea, he wanted to live surrounded by trees even in Seoul. Even artists have images that fill their hearts. "Art is neither philosophy nor aesthetics. It simply exists like the sky, sea, mountains, and rocks. Think of the time before the concept of flowers existed, before the name 'flower' existed. It was just vague abstraction."

The phrase that came to me at the place where Kim Hwan-ki dreamed his dreams was a diary entry he wrote nine months before his death. At the moment heading toward the end of life, the artist turned toward the source of all things. This hometown land, which he called "just a dreamlike island," settled deep in his heart as he embarked on a long journey as an artist.

I have been trapped in time for months without the leisure to feel the seasons. Suddenly, cold air wraps around my body. Another daily life created by sudden change leads many things inward. How about taking out the representations of daily life one by one? Perhaps from many things long forgotten or just passed by, new meanings may be discovered.

Kim Bora, Curator and Director of Seongbuk-gu Art Museum