Meditation

Under the dark night sky are crowded outlines of identical gable-roofed houses cascading down a slope. Inside the maze of houses are silhouettes of seated figures, a recurring motif in the artist’s later works.

Throughout his life, Yoong Bae created works of art that infused Korean artistic traditions with elements from modern Western art. Seeking to create a new visual language incorporating both cultures, he said, “I feel that the artist has an obligation to preserve and even reinterpret the traditional arts. I prefer not to change them but to learn from them and then use them as I adapt them to my needs.” As one of the founders of modern Korean printmaking, Bae introduced Western methods of printmaking to Korea and established the Contemporary Korean Printmakers Association in 1968. The artist remained active in both Korea and the San Francisco Bay Area, where he moved in 1974.