Artist Lee Bae Is Reviving Ancient Korean Rituals in Venice

Lee Bae’s “La Maison de la Lune Brûlée.”">

Entering Lee Bae’s show “La Maison de la Lune Brûlée” in Venice feels like going on a mystical immersive journey, where minimal multisensory hints in space activate the senses, taking one to rediscover ancient Korean traditions of reconnection between the human worlds and the cosmos. Hosted in Fondation Wilmotte as one of the collateral events of the 60th Venice Biennial, the exhibition reactivates the timeless wisdom of Korean philosophy and folklore traditions through contemporary art to rediscover cyclical cosmologies and communal ancestral rituals of renewal and reconnection with the harmonious rhythm of nature, overcoming any dichotomy between nature/culture imposed by modern time.

More specifically, the entire exhibition is both an homage and an exploration of a century-old Korean ritual known as Moonhouse Burning (in Korean, “daljip taeugi”), which is traditionally held on the first full moon as a community moment of symbolic celebration of cyclical cosmology.

Lee Bae is probably one of the most acclaimed South Korean artists on the international scene today, celebrated for his strictly monochromatic paintings characterized by highly meditative minimal brushstrokes where action and intention act in unison. Bae is often considered a second-generation or post–Dansaekhwa artist who carries on the movement’s legacy by attributing deep philosophical value to his painting technique. Ultimately, his artistic practice already has this highly ritualistic aspect, echoing the labor-intensive and meditative approaches seen in Dansaekhwa and drawing on the connections between ancient Korean calligraphy and spirituality.

For this show, Bae, in concert with curator Valentina Buzzi and exhibition director Jaeho Jung, decided to reactivate this heritage. “When we discussed centering the show on the ritual of the Moonhouse Burning, first we considered the theme of the 60th Venice Biennale ‘Foreigners Everywhere,’ which explores how one can feel foreign due to various social, political and cultural factors,” Buzzi told Observer. “We wanted our exhibition to align with this leitmotif but to look at it from another angle: how can we feel a sort of oneness that goes beyond the peculiarities and singularities that each of us possesses and makes us unique or foreign? Lee Bae’s art, for those who are familiar with it, talks about an absolute, in a sense. We wanted to bring that absolute into the room.”

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The exhibition also provides a unique insight into Bae’s background—which inspires his artistic practice, his path to becoming an artist and what makes his identity unique. The artist, in fact, comes from Cheongdo, a small town in the countryside that still follows rural rhythms in sync with nature.

“The daljip teugi is centuries old and, to date, is practiced as a moment to connect with nature, the moon and harvesting rhythms,” Buzzi said. “As the daljip teugi is a ritual, we attentively looked at it and practiced it with the community in Cheongdo, to then deconstruct its main symbology and reconstruct it through a multisensory path in the exhibition, involving video, sound composition, painting, installation, and sculptures. We wanted this very unique tradition with a precise identity to become transformed into something absolute that could touch the soul of our visitors by being understandable beyond particularities. The work of Lee Bae itself works almost like a ritual, like a prayer, and by doing so, it was able to transform the foundation into almost a sacred space.”

More significantly, given the accelerated development South Korea went through and how the country has become increasingly popular for its contemporary culture, this effort to revitalize ancestral rituals and spiritualities and to explore how those are expressed in the art of Lee Bae, as in all the Dansaekhwa movement, provides a precious take on the country’s culture. “We wanted to show something different, something that looks at the roots of its civilization and culture and that can help the audience learn about Korea beyond what is popular,” explained Buzzi.

In elaborating on this curatorial framework, the curator tapped into her own background: born in Italy but living in Korea for years, she is currently completing Ph.D. research into the connection between cultural heritage and contemporary art and their synergies. She told us she “was enthusiastic about working together with Lee Bae and Jung Jaeho to bring this idea to life and to show how ancient rituals and folk heritage can help us connect deeply with parts of ourselves that we may have forgotten and can be pivotal in this day and age to reconnect us with different rhythms, and the empathy we so much need.”

Notably, the entire show presents a minimal display, but it’s very dense with philosophical concepts and narratives while providing a multi-sensory experience. The space has become a sacred temple suspended in time, and visitors are invited to take an initiatory journey through a disorienting white space, as layers of special white paper cover all the surfaces. Here, Bae painted The Brushstroke (2024) using charcoal paint derived from an actual Moonhouse combustion.

Despite its simplicity, this exhibition required an ambitious and challenging installation, particularly in a place like Venice. “One of the biggest challenges was the idea of covering the entire foundation with paper that could last for the duration of the Biennale, despite the adverse meteorological conditions and the persistent humidity that bathes Venice,” Buzzi said.

The knowledge of traditional Korean artisans, long-time collaborators of Bae who adhered the paper to the walls using a layering technique called dobae, was essential. The curator recalled that, “during the setup days, which lasted around two weeks, it was a constant dance with the weather to know when to start working on the paper, rest and stop until the humidity level lowered. We learned once again to coexist with the rhythms of nature, which we cannot really overcome. It was spectacular, yet nerve-wracking, to assist his painting performance, as he only had one possibility, without any space for failure. It was a magic moment that I believe we will all treasure for a long time.”

The Brushstroke (2024) installations, which unfold on both the floor and the walls of the space, are complemented by a 4.6-meter-tall monumental monolith made of graphite titled Meok (2024), carved in Zimbabwe, and a work on canvas, Issu du Feu (2024), where the artist has transformed charcoal flakes into a complex abstract mosaic of contrasting highlights and opacities. Notably, those are the only signature works in the show that represent what collectors usually know Lee Bae for, especially in commercial settings such as galleries and art fairs.

The exhibition as a whole focuses more on sensory experiences and epiphanies than the physical presence of the artworks, allowing one to experience the void and the negative space in between. These choices align with the importance of absence and negative space in Asian philosophy but also echo some aspects we can see in ancient Greek culture. “As someone who works and researches between East and West, I believe that finding these rooted connections once again can bring us together and generate new ways of understanding,” Buzzi told us.

This experience of the absence and the art in between intensifies the experience of the works themselves. “The entire idea of a negative space helps us understand how impermanent our existence, as well as our practice, is and so opens a space for finding connections with one another, between artworks, with us and without us, abandoning the ego to welcome something else,” she said. “As a method of painting and making art, absencing means erasing oneself from the work and through the work. With each brushstroke, the artist empties himself and becomes lighter. As a result, the work becomes a place where one can practice absence.”

In the first corridor that leads to the exhibition hall, an immersive video installation, Burning (2024), lets visitors experience the daljip teugi through video combined with the sound composition Sailing Through Fire (2024) by Tod Machover, which offers a glimpse into an ancient ritual unknown to many. Bae burnt messages of wishes for the new year from all around the world transcribed onto traditional Korean hanji paper, during the ceremony in February in the city of Cheongdo.

To make this possible, the artist and the exhibition team engaged with the community of Cheongdo in what Buzzi called a magical experience. “When the Moonhouse is set on fire under the moonlight, traditional dances and compositions are played with traditional instruments,” she explained. “The next day, the ashes are collected and used to fertilize the land. Charcoal in Cheongdo is used not only to fertilize the land but also to protect it from weather conditions when added to building constructions. It is a very different view of charcoal from the one we have in Europe, where I am from.”

Exiting the exhibition hall, visitors traverse Moon (2024), an ephemeral structure enveloped in paper through the marouflage technique and illuminated by a ceiling in yellow glass panels. Creating an awe-inspiring path, the structure leads to the Venetian waters, encouraging a moment of renewal and connection with nature, not only by contemplation of the Venetian lagoon but also the moonlight, which evokes the mystical atmosphere unfolding in Cheongdo during the burning ritual.

What is remarkable about this ambitious exhibition is how it succeeded in translating the profound philosophical and spiritual meanings grounded on ancient traditions while highlighting the power of contemporary art to revive them. In this way, the project extends the presentation of Lee Bae’s work beyond the celebration of the artist to a broader acknowledgment and valorization of the entire heritage from which it draws. In this way, the exhibition presents the essence of Korean culture more broadly, providing a glimpse into its genesis and the precedents of the popular culture Korea is now mostly known for globally.

Through this blend of art and ritual, the exhibition allows visitors to explore and revive in Venice the timeless wisdom of Korean philosophy while also raising important questions about the significance of ancient traditions in modern times and the lost connection with nature’s cyclical rhythms. Remarkably, this broader perspective not only sheds light on Korean culture but also delves into ancestral spiritual beliefs and rituals and their connection with nature, which are shared by different communities and have the power to connect humanity in various parts of the world.

Lee Bae’s “La Maison de la Lune Brûlée” is on view at the Wilmotte Foundation in Venice through November 28.