Lot 223: Park Sookeun (1914-1965)

Winter Signed in hangul, Sookeun Oil and mixed media on board, framed 8 13/16 x 17 7/16in. (22.5 x 44.3cm.) Paper label affixed to verso of Bando Art Gallery, Bando Hotel, Seoul NOTES Sookeun's work was widely appreciated by Americans stationed in Seoul after the Korean War. Now it is prized by Korean collectors and museums as well. The Bando Gallery in the Choson Hotel in Seoul began exhibiting his paintings in 1956, selling them for a nominal sum to clients who were predominately Americans. The artist's career was cut short by his premature death at the age of fifty-one in 1965. During the past eight years, since Christie's, New York began selling his work, he has become the most sought-after modern Korean master. Eleven paintings by Park Sookeun have been sold at Christie's: Farmers, 27 April, 1993, lot 45; Dancers, 17 November, 1993, lot 121; Woman beneath a tree, 27 April, 1994, lot 101; Country village, 25 October, 1994, lot 78; Three woman and child, 26 April, 1995, lot 77; Farmhouses, 26 March, 1996, lot 67; Men smoking, 31 October, 1996, lot 110; The Jobless, 23 March, 1999, lot 311 and 15 October, 2001, lot 333; Mother and child, 15 September, 1999, lot 384; Four women and child, 23 March, 2000, lot 379; Mother and child walking under trees, 19 September, 2000, lot 410.