An exhibit of more than a hundred fifty works drawn primarily from the National Museum of Korea dazzles with paintings, scultpture, and decorative arts —particularly ceramics— in this first ever full-scale survey available to U.S. audiences. During the Joseon dynasty —the name Joseon derives from the dominant state in ancient Korea— paintings of the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries revealed a distinctly Korean character. Longevity is a principal theme of Joseon art, often symbolized by cranes, deer, rocks, water, the sun, the moon, paired birds, and tortoise.
Treasures from Korea: Arts and Culture of the Joseon Dynasty, 1392-1910 opens March 2 at the Philadelphia Museum of Art.
The exhibition is organized by the National Museum of Korea, the Philadelphia Museum of Art, the Los Angeles County Museum of Art, and the Museum of Fine Arts, Houston. Treasures from Korea is made possible in part by grants from the National Endowment for the Humanities (NEH).