Lee Suk Ju

Lee Suk Ju (b. 1952) is a first-generation Korean hyperrealist who, in the 1970s, brought hyperrealism into a Korean art scene then dominated by abstraction, opening a new current in figurative painting. Rather than the detached objectivity of American hyperrealism, he uses meticulous, photorealistic technique to express personal emotion, arranging recurring motifs — horses, clocks, trains, fallen leaves, books — that symbolize time within dreamlike, contrasted compositions. He earned his MFA and BFA in painting from Hongik University, taught for three decades at Sookmyung Women's University (now professor emeritus), and his work is held by the National Museum of Modern and Contemporary Art Korea, Seoul Museum of Art, Fukuoka Art Museum, Hoam Museum, and the Smith College Museum of Art, among others.