Painter, sculptor, writer and philosopher Lee Ufan came to prominence in the late 1960s as one of the major theoretical and practical proponents of the avant-garde Mono-ha (Object School) group. The Mono-ha school of thought was Japan’s first contemporary art movement to gain international recognition. It rejected Western notions of representation, focusing on the relationships of materials and perceptions rather than on expression or intervention.The artists of Mono-ha present works made of raw physical materials that have barely been manipulated. In 1991 Lee Ufan began his series of Correspondance paintings, which consist of just one or two grey-blue brushstrokes, made of a mixture of oil and crushed stone pigment, applied onto a large white surface. His sculptural series Relatum is equally minimal: each work is comprised of one or more light-colored round stones and dark, rectangular iron plates. The dialectical relationship between brushstroke and canvas is mimicked in the relationship between stone and iron plate. In Ufan’s installations space is at the same time untouched and engaged, at the confines between doing and non-doing. The relationship between painted / unpainted and occupied / empty space lies at the heart of Lee Ufan’s practice.
Lee Ufan was born on June 24th, 1936, in Kyongnam, South Korea. He studied calligraphy, poetry and painting at the College of Kyongnam and the University of Seoul. His work has been shown at Dia Beacon, Beacon, USA (long term view); National Art Center, Tokyo, Japan (2022); Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Park, Washington, USA (2019-2020); Pompidou Metz, Metz, France (2019); Serpentine Galleries, London, UK (2018); Couvent de la Tourette, Eveux, France (2017); Centre de Création Contemporaine Olivier Debré, Tours, France (2017); Château La Coste, Le Puy-Sainte-Réparade, France (2016); Palace of Versailles, Versailles, France (2014); Guggenheim Museum, New York, NY, USA (2011), Royal Museums of Fine Arts of Belgium, Brussels, Belgium (2009); the Yokohama Museum of Art, Yokohama, Japan (2005); the Musée d’Art Moderne de Saint-Etienne Métropole, Rhône-Alpes, France (2005); the Samsung Museum of Modern Art, Seoul, South Korea (2003); Kunstmuseum Bonn, Germany (2001); the Galerie Nationale du Jeu de Paume, Paris, France (1997); and the National Museum of Contemporary Art, Seoul, South Korea (1994). He was awarded the Praemium Imperiale for painting in 2001 and the UNESCO Prize in 2000. In 2010 the Lee Ufan Museum, designed by Tadao Ando, opened at Benesse Art Site, Naoshima, Japan.
SELECTED SOLO EXHIBITION
2024 | Hamburger Bahnhof – Nationalgalerie der Gegenwart, Berlin, Germany
2022
Hyogo Prefectural Museum of Art, Kobe, Japan
The National Art Center, Tokyo
2021
Lisson Gallery, London
Les Alyscamps, Arles, France
Pace Gallery, East Hampton, New York
2019
Lee Ufan: Open Dimension, Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden
Dia Beacon, NY, USA
Acorns and Wildcat & Traces, Cahiers d’Art, Paris, France
Lee Ufan. Inhabiting time, Centre Pompidou Metz, France
2018 | Serpentine Galleries, London, United Kingdom
2017
Pace Gallery, New York, USA
Centre de Création Contemporaine Olivier Debré, Tours, France
Couvent de La Tourette, Éveux, France
2016
Hermitage Museum, St. Petersburg, Russia
Château La Coste, Le Puy-Sainte-Réparade, France
Manufacture nationale de Sèvres, France
Castello di Ama, Siena, Italy
2015
Lisson Gallery, London, United Kingdom
Palazzo Contarini Polignac, Venice, Italy
Pace Gallery, New York, USA
Pace Gallery, London, United Kingdom
Pace Gallery, Hong Kong
2014
Château de Versailles, France
Kaikai Kiki Gallery, Tokyo, Japan
Tatintsian Gallery, Moscow, Russia
2013
Le Capitole, “Les Rencontres d’Arles”, Arles, France
Musée de la Chasse et de la Nature, Paris, France
Galerie Kamel Mennour, Paris, France
2012 | Asia Society Texas Center, Houston, USA
2011
Galerie Thaddaeus Ropac, Salzburg, Austria
Guggenheim Museum, New York, USA
SCAI The Bathhouse Gallery, Tokyo, Japan
Gallery Hyundai, Seoul, South Korea
2010
Blum & Poe, Los Angeles, USA
Galería Elvira González, Madrid, Spain
2009
Kukje Gallery, Seoul, South Korea
Galerie Thaddaeus Ropac, Paris, France
2008
Royal Museums of Fine Arts of Belgium, Brussels, Belgium
Dahlem Museum, Berlin, Germany
Pace Wildenstein, New York, USA
Tokyo Gallery, Tokyo, Japan
Lisson Gallery, London, United Kingdom
2007
Galerie nächst St. Stephan, Vienna, Austria
Resonance, 52nd Venice Biennale, Palazzo Palumbo Fossati, Venice, Italy
SCAI The Bathhouse Gallery, Tokyo, Japan
2006
Galerie Micheline Szwajcer, Antwerp, Belgium
IBU Gallery, Paris, France
Galerie m, Bochum, Germany
Konggan Gallery, Busan, South Korea
Shirota Gallery, Tokyo, Japan
Gallery Muramatsu, Tokyo
2005
Yokohama Museum of Art, Yokohama, Japan
Musée d’Art Moderne, Saint-Étienne, France
[...] individual exhibitions from 1967
SELECTED GROUP EXHIBITIONS
2023 | Lee Ufan and Claude Viallat: Encounter, Pace Gallery, London
2020 | STARS: Six Contemporary Artists from Japan to the World, Mori Art Museum, Tokyo, Japan
2019 | The Challenging Souls: Yves Klein, Lee Ufan, Ding Yi, Power Station of Art, Shanghai, China
2017
Everything at Once, Lisson Gallery, London
Japanorama. Nouveau regard sur la création contemporaine, Centre Pompisou-Metz, France
2016
When Process Becomes Form: Dansaekhwa and Korean Abstraction, Boghossian Foundation, Brussels, Belgium
Dansaekhwa & Minimalism, Blum & Poe, Los Angeles
Dansaekhwa & Minimalism, Blum & Poe, New York
2015
56th Venice Biennale, Dansaekhwa, Palazzo Contarini Polignac, Venice, Italy
Enrico Castellani and Lee Ufan: Surgaces et Correspondences, Lorenzelli Arte, Milan, Italy
Korean Abstract Painting: 45th Anniversary of Gallery Hyundai, Gallery Hyundai, Seoul, South Korea
2014
From All Sides: Tansaekhwa on Abstraction, Blum & Poe, Los Angeles, USA
The Art of Dansaekhwa, Kukje Gallery, Seoul, Korea
Formes Simples, Centre Pompidou-Metz, France
Genius Loci (Spirit of Place), Palazzo Franchetti, Venice, Italy
Korean Beauty: Two Kinds of Nature, Seoul Museum of the National Museum of Modern and Contemporary Art, Seoul, Korea
Other Primary Structures: Others 2, Jewish Museum, New York, USA
2013
Mingei: Are You Here?, Pace London, London
Parallel Views: Italian and Japanese Art from the 1950s, 60s, and 70s, Rachofsky, The Warehouse, Dallas, USA
Paradise, Pace Gallery, New York, USA
Takahashi Collection: Mindfulness!, Kirishima Open-Air Museum, Kagoshima, Japan
Prima Materia, Punta della Dogana, Venice, Italy
Tokyo 1955–1970: A New Avant-Garde, Museum of Modern Art, New York, USA
2012
Requiem for the Sun: The Art of Mono-ha, Blum & Poe, Los Angeles, USA
Requiem for the Sun: The Art of Mono-ha, Gladstone Gallery, New York, USA
Summer Group Show 2012, The Pace Gallery, New York, USA
Art as Magic: Visionary Artists and Their Inner Supernatural World, Aichi Prefectural Museum of Art, Nagoya, Japan
2011
54th Venice Biennale, The World Belongs to You, Palazzo Grassi, and Personal Structures, Palazzo Bembo, Venice, Italy
Beijing Voice: Leaving Realism Behind, The Pace Gallery, Beijing, China
Burning, Bright: A Short History of the Light Bulb, The Pace Gallery, New York, USA
Tricks & Humor, Yokosuka Museum of Art, Kanagawa, Japan
Pure Clay: Young Sook Park and Lee Ufan, RH Gallery, New York, USA
Silence and Time, Dallas Museum of Art, Dallas, USA
In Praise of Doubt, Punta della Dogana, Francois Pinault Foundation, Venice, Italy
2010
50 Years at Pace, The Pace Gallery, New York, USA
Painting: Process and Expansion: From the 1950s to the Present Day, Museum Moderner Kunst Stiftung Ludwig Wien, Vienna, Austria
Personal Structures: Time-Space-Existence, Künstlerhaus Palais Thurn & Taxis, Bregenz, Austria
Essential Experience, riso Galleria Regionale della Sicilia, Palermo, Italy
2009
In-finitum, Palazzo Fortuny, Venice, Italy
Qui a peur des artistes ? Collection François Pinault, Palais des Arts, Dinard, France
2008
Sensitive Systems, Hakgojae Gallery, Seoul, South Korea
La Sottile Linea d’ombra, Fondazione Mudima, Milan, Italy
Sotto voce, Yvon Lambert Gallery, New York, USA
1st Poznań Biennale, Poznań, Poland
2007
Elastic Taboos, Kunsthalle, Vienna, Austria
Living in the Material World: “Things” in Art of the 20th Century and Beyond, The National Art Center, Tokyo, Japan
L’Art de Monet et sa postérité, The National Art Center, Tokyo, Japan
2006
La Force de l’art, Grand Palais, Paris, France
6th Gwangju Biennale, Gwangju, South Korea
Shelter, Nationalgalerie, Berlin, Germany
2005 | Reconsidering Mono-ha, The National Museum of Art, Osaka, Japan
[...] collective exhibition from 1968
PUBLIC COLLECTIONS
Hermitage Museum, St. Petersburg, Russia
Albright Knox Museum, Buffalo, NY
Art Gallery of New South Wales, Sydney
Asia Society Texas Center, Houston
Busan Municipal Museum of Art, Korea
Brooklyn Museum, New York
Castello di Ama, Siena, Italy
Centre Georges Pompidou, Musée National d’Art Moderne, Paris
Commanderie de Peyrassol, Flassans-sur-Issole, France
Dallas Museum of Art, Dallas
Donjon de Vez, France FNAC, Paris, France
Fondazione Mudima, Milan
Frederik Meijer Gardens & Sculpture Park, Grand Rapids
Fukuoka Museum of Art, Japan
Galerie Nationale de Prague, Czech Republic
Hokkaido Museum of Modern Art, Sapporo, Japan
Hakone Open-Air Museum, Kanagawa, Japan
Hara Museum of Contemporary Art, Tokyo
Hiroshima City Museum of Contemporary Art, Japan
The Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden, Washington DC
Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, New York
Iwaki City Art Museum, Fukushima, Japan
Kröller-Müller Rijksmuseum, Otterloo, The Netherlands
Kunsthalle Nürnberg, Germany
Kunsthaus Zurich, Switzerland
Kunstmuseum Bonn, Germany
Kunstsammlungen der Ruhr-Universität Bochum, Germany
Leeum Samsung Museum of Art, Seoul
Lee Ufan Museum, Naoshima, Japan
Le Musée de Sculpture en Plein Air, Paris
M+ Museum, Hong Kong
Miyagi Museum of Art, Sendai, Japan
Museum of Fine Arts, Gifu, Japan
Museum of Modern Art, Kamakura & Hayama, Japan
The Museum of Modern Art, New York
The National Museum of Art, Osaka
National Museum of Contemporary Art, Seoul
National Museum of Modern Art, Kyoto
National Museum of Modern Art, Seoul
National Museum of Modern Art, Tokyo
Nationalgalerie, Berlin
Niigata Prefectural Museum of Art, Japan
Ohara Museum of Art, Okayama, Japan
Pinault Foundation, Venice
Queensland Art Gallery, Brisbane, Australia
Seoul Municipal Museum of Art, Korea
Setagaya Art Museum, Tokyo
Sezon Museum of Modern Art, Nagano, Japan
São Paulo Art Library, Brazil
Situation Kunst, Bochum, Germany
Sonja Henle-Niels Onstad Museum, Oslo, Norway
Space Lee Ufan, Busan, Korea
Staatliche Kunstsammlungen Dresden, Germany
Städtisches Museum Leverkusen, Germany
Städtisches Museum im Städel, Frankfurt
Stuttgart Staatsgalerie, Germany
Sundheim Collection, New York
Sunjae Museum of Art, Korea
Takamatsu City Museum of Art, Kagawa, Japan
Tate Modern Gallery, London
Tochigi Prefectural Museum of Fine Arts, Utsunomiya, Japan
Tokyo Metropolitan Museum of Contemporary Art, Japan
Toyota Municipal Museum of Art, Aichi, Japan
Utsunomiya City Museum of Art, Tochigi, Japan
Worcester Art Museum, MA
