A new world of calligraphy now opens here.
Moosan Huh Hwe-tae is in the center of this world.
His pieces done with an enormous brush on oversized paper are mostly 100-ho scale.
The brush he uses is too big to deal with just one hand.
Huh Hwe-tae does his work with all his heart.
The subject matter of calligraphy is usually characters.
However, what Huh Hwe-tae draws are neither letters nor landscapes.
As the times change, calligraphy goes beyound simple, classical beauty.
Huh's soulful, vigorous brushwork is seldom found in the entire history of calligraphy.
His 40-year life comes through in his works.
Q:What do you think is most significant in your work?
There are quite a few artists who have appropriated the idiom of Eastern calligraphy.
On the countrary, I have strived for long years to revive the vitality of brushstrokes in a form of painting.
The point is most important in my calligraphic art.
Huh Hwe-tae, a calligrapher whose 1995 entry to the National Art Exhibition of Korea secured the grand prize.
While continuing his career-long involvement in calligraphy, he invented his own distingtive
art style Emogaphy which is either calligraphy or painting.
In conventional calligraphy a meaning is conveyed through characters, but Huh's Emography carries
his emotions in its form.
In other words, he converys a new message within the framework of calligraphy.
The title of this work is <The place Where Childlike Innocence Dwells>.
Why don't you recall the horse-riding game as a child? This work is a manifestation of the game.
Condensed and then scribbled by one stroke of a brush, this figure is on the horse,
namely on the back of a person. This part is reminiscent of a figure stooping down.
Huh Hwe tae's brushstrokes evoking rough feelings. Huh's work done by each vigorous brushstroke feels deep.
It differs from Western artworks coated with paint by giddy brush touches.
Q: How is Huh Hwe-tae's work evaluated?
Lee Dong-guk, Calligraphy Critic
All calligraphers have to worry seriously about the future of calligraphic art.
Calligaphy, the arts of characters, should have its own features to survive in the sea of contemporary art.
Huh's work is highly regarded as an exquisite blend of the traditional and the modern.
Huh Hwe-tae, at the age of five, began his studies of Chinese classics and held his own solo exhibition as a student.
His Emography is the result of his 40-year-long artistic endeavors and challenges.
It is known that the art of Mark Tobey and Adolf Gottlieb was inspired by Eastern calligaphy.
Huh's pieces, faithful to the essence of Eastern calligraphy appear to be quite different from their works.
What's the difference between Emography and works of Western art?
Emogrphy seems lively and vigorous in its brushstrokes while works of Western art focus primarily
on the embodiment of form.
It's provably true that no Western artists are able to overtake the brushwork of Eastern calligraphers.
With the invition of the Korean Culture Center in Germany, Huh's Emography meets the new world in this May.
Westerners meet the East in Berlin. Huh's work done by all his heart and strength makes a deep impression
on the Western audience, raising their intense interest. Huh Hwe-tae is now in the culmination of his art,
but intends to alter the way to create another kind of artworks.
For him, calligraphy is both art and life itself.
Q:What's your future plan and objective?
I wish to make my Emography widely known not only in New York and Basel Art Fair but in many prestigious
galleries in France and Germany.