‘When shape, colour and pattern have been reduced to a bare minimum...something else happens; it becomes a mysterious object’ – Ellsworth Kelly
Lyndsey Ingram and Tristan Hoare are delighted to collaborate on their first Frieze Masters Exhibition! We originally planned a booth presenting early work by the American artist Ellsworth Kelly alongside Moon Jars by Korean artist Kim Yikyung, known as the ‘mother of Korean ceramics’. Kelly greatly admired Korean ceramics, particularly the iconic Moon Jars, and our intention was to bring them together for the first time.
Following the cancellation of the physical fair, we have decided to put on this exhibition and expand the horizon, combining ancient works from the collection of John Kasmin with abstract American post-war prints. Kasmin’s gallery showed many of these important artists in London for the first time. Our aim is to explore and develop a conversation between more ancient forms and the contemporary abstract language that emerged in America from the 1960’s onwards.
Kim Yikyung’s Moon Jars date from the late 20th century, but the form developed much earlier in the 17th and 18thCenturies during the Joseun period in Korea. The shapes made today are directly connected with this past and offer an interesting comparison to the American prints which come from the new and dynamic culture that emerged there in the 20th century.
The exhibition will include a Neolithic Chinese pot, an 18th century ceramic Moroccan jug, a wooden Minianka sceptre from Mali, dating from the early 20th century and a 19th Century Sake Bowl from Japan. These are combined with work by Helen Frankenthaler, Jasper Johns, and Donald Judd, in addition to Kelly’s lithographs from the early 1960s.