Lee Ufan

Lee Ufan is considered one of the most important artists from Asia; his works are included in some of the most important collections worldwide…

Lee Ufan’s particular radicalism is associated with his contribution to the Mono-Ha (the school of things) movement of the late 1960s and 1970s in Japan. His continuing ‘Relatum’ series of sculptures began at this time and encapsulate the sensibilities of the art movement that characterise his work…

Born in Korea and educated in Japan, Lee Ufan has played a pioneering role in modern art in both countries. He is a painter, sculptor, and theorist who has bridged East and West. In the late 1960s, he led the Mono-ha movement in Japan and represented its aesthetic position.

Ses oeuvres récentes montrent un ou deux points gris appliqués par un gros pinceau sur une toile blanche ou, pour la sculpture, une plaque métallique avec une grosse pierre…

“A successful dialogue,” Silke von Bersordt-Wallrabe writes in her catalogue essay, “is characterized by the fact that it keeps activity (one’s own utterances) and passivity (taking in, following, responding to one’s counterpart) in a dynamic balance.” Lee Ufan’s artistic work in both theory and practice, as well as his personal biography, demonstrate the artist’s mastery at crossing boundaries and initiating dialogues between cultures, philosophies, materials, and space. A founder and spokesperson of the Mono-ha (Object School) group, he mediates between gesture and nature, giving rise to new perceptions and creating “poetic moments of encounter between vision and the world.”