Byung-hun Min
Korean, born 1955

Trees, 2003
gelatin silver print
7 ¼ x 6 ¾ in.

SBMA, Gift of the Artist
2005.26

COMMENTS

Byung-Hun Min was born in Seoul, South Korea in 1955. Min started out as a musician and vocalist, then a student of electronic engineering, before finally discovering photography. He turned to study photography in his late 20’s at the Soon-tae Hong studio, from where he has pursued a successful career in photography, eventually awarded the Dong-A International Photography Salon’s silver medal (1984).

Min’s black-and-white photography often represents nature and the environment; and his pictures aim to capture the essence of the Korean landscape. His photographs also draw references back to traditional Korean and East Asian art and culture, with a resemblance to Ink Scroll Paintings, floral themes, and a focus on simplicity and minimalist compositions. His pictures are often attributed to being able to capture the delicacy and silence of nature. Min’s photographs also require effort on the part of the viewer. The subject of his pictures may be obscured, like the canvas of a greenhouse in his Weeds series, or obscured by light, like in the Snow land series, or the subject may be in the distance beyond a fog-like vale, forcing the viewer to focus his attention persistently in order to have the subject of the picture revealed, as in the Trees and Flowers series.

- peterfetterman.com

SBMA CURATORIAL LABELS

The monochromatic subtleties of Byung-Hun Min’s photographs reveal haunting yet calm landscapes. His metaphysical scenes, veiled in soft grays, capture the essence of a forest scene, indicating no sense of time or place, but merely silent existence. Min, a South Korean photographer, intends to capture the Korean landscape through medium tones of black and white―a unique balance he captures through cloud covered scenes that lack a light source.
Echoing the ink scroll paintings and floral themes of Korean and East Asian art and culture, he creates minimal, serene landscapes of the natural world. His image requires scrutiny and patience to discern the skeletal trees as they slowly appear through a blanket of fog. Karen Sinsheimer so eloquently described Min’s work in her introduction to his 2007 monograph, “His palette is subdued and sensuous, undramatic yet commanding.”

- Ridley-Tree Gallery, 2016