Pen Varlen, born in Primorsky Krai, Russia in 1916 to first-generation Korean immigrants, was an art professor for 35 years at the Ilya Repin Leningrad Institute for Painting, Sculpture and Architecture. He remained largely unknown in Korea during his lifetime and after his death in 1990. For the first time, Korean viewers had a chance to explore his life and work thanks to a large-scale retrospective held from March 3 to May 8, at the National Museum of Modern and Contemporary Art (MMCA ).

“Liberation” (1959). Oil on canvas, 200 x 365 cm. The painting depicts how the Soviet airborne forces in 1945 heroically released North Korean prisoners who had struggled to survive during long detention at the concentration camp in Chongjin.

There is a self-portrait of the artist. The upper body is expressed in seemingly rough, but confident and carefree brushstrokes. In the portrait, the artist is depicted looking upward. So even when face-to-face with the subject, it feels as if you are looking up at him. This clearly denotes the artist’s sense of pride. However, the portrait is incomplete and it bears no signature— as if to suggest his position (or lack thereof in this case) in Korea’s contemporary art history.

Portrait of the Dancer Choi Seung-hee” (1954). Oil on canvas, 118 x 84 cm. This portrait depicts the dancer not in the luxurious Western image that the public is more familiar with but in a strong and benevolent mother image that reflects socialist values.

Cherishing the Motherland
The spring flowers were in full bloom along the way to the Deoksugung branch of the National Museum of Modern and Contemporary Art, where the Pen Varlen Retrospective was being held. The path leading from the front gate of the palace to the exhibition hall was lined with banners featuring unfamiliar Russian letters. They spelled out Byun Wol-ryong’s name in Russian, Пен Варлен. Though known as Pen Varlen in Russia, he was an ethnic Korean who lived under the Korean name Byun Wol-ryong all his life.
Byun was born in 1916 in Russia — in Shkotovsky, Primorsky Krai, located to the southeast of Siberia. His parents had settled there after crossing the Tuman River to flee from hunger and poverty. Byun showed a talent for art from early childhood. After completing his secondary education in Sinhanchon (or New Koreatown) in Vladivostok, he was sent by his parents to faraway Sverdlovsk (now Yekaterinburg) Art School near the Ural Mountains. While he was there, his family was forcibly relocated to Central Asia under Stalin’s deportation policy. After graduation in 1940, he entered the Leningrad Institute for Painting, Sculpture and Architecture, which was attended by the brightest aspiring artists of the Soviet Union at that time. Thanks to his noteworthy talent and hard work, Byun earned recognition from the professors for his graduation assignment, “Korean Fishermen” (1947). He went on to graduate school, received his doctorate degree in 1951, and became an assistant professor at the drawing department of the Leningrad Institute, which was later renamed the Ilya Repin Leningrad Institute for Painting, Sculpture and Architecture in honor of the Russian realist painter Ilya Repin.
In June 1953, Byun was dispatched to North Korea at the command of the Soviet Ministry of Culture. The North Korean government had pinpointed Byun as the artist who was needed to reestablish Pyongyang University of Fine Arts, which had been destroyed during the Korean War.

While serving as its dean and advisor for 15 months, Byun helped the university to draw up a curriculum, train art teachers, and organize an exhibition to mark the ninth anniversary of Korea’s liberation from Japanese colonial rule. He ended up overworking himself, fell ill, and decided to return to the Soviet Union to regain his health and replenish his painting supplies. But he never made it back to North Korea. He had refused to be naturalized as a North Korean citizen, and moreover, his North Korean supporters Chong Sang-jin, the vice minister of culture who had arranged for his entry into the country, and Ri Sang-jo, ambassador to the Soviet Union, had since been purged in a power struggle. Due to the political circumstances and his personal stance, his reentry was not possible. Though he had dedicated his efforts to laying the foundation for North Korean art, for which he earned the admiration and respect of local artists, he would never again set foot on North Korean soil. All traces of Byun have been erased from North Korea’s art history, as if he had never existed.

“Rice Planting in Korea” (1955). Oil on canvas, 116.2 x 201.5 cm.

Four Halls, Four Themes
The retrospective displayed 200 works, including oils, etchings, lithographs, and drawings, organized into four themes: Panorama of Leningrad, Po traits with Souls, Journey to Pyongyang, and Landscapes of Diaspora. As the first exhibition for the Korean public to view Byun Wol-ryong’s world of art, the format traced his footsteps throughout life. The docents, rather than explaining the artworks, seemed more intent on telling the story of the artist.
Byun’s works are mostly faithful, realistic depictions of his subjects. Fine etchings and oil paintings characterized by passionate brushstrokes accounted for the better part of the exhibition. Four posters commissioned by a publisher during his younger years as well as preparatory sketches provide us with abundant sources to observe his art world.
Especially striking are the people depicted in his paintings. In “Portrait of the Dancer Choi Seung-hee” (1954), Korea’s first contemporary dancer and dance theorist Choi Seung-hee is dressed in traditional hanbok, holding a red fan. She was an internationally- renowned dancer but was later purged by the North Korean regime. Other portraits include the 1953 painting of Han Seol-ya (1900–1976), who had prepared the groundwork for North Korea’s juche (self-reliance) literature, and the 1954 portrait of Won Honggu (1888–1970), an ornithologist. His son Won Pyong-oh, also an ornithologist, who lived in South Korea, tagged a bird and released it over the DMZ in an attempt to inform his father in the North that he was alive in the South. Another impressive work is the portrait of Russian writer Boris Pasternak, painted in 1947.

Actually, this is not the first time that Byun Wol-ryong’s paintings have been displayed in Korea. The “Liberation and Division” section of the Centennial of Korean Art, held at the MMCA in 2005 to commemorate the 60th anniversary of national liberation, showed a few of his paintings in a quiet corner. As a student of Korean contemporary art history at the time, it was my first introduction to Byun’s works.

“Repatriation of North Korean Prisoners of War at Panmunjom” (1953). Oil on canvas, 51 x 71 cm. This is a scene of Panmunjom in early August 1953 when a prisoner exchange took place between North and South Korea. Byun Wol-ryong was there, recording the prisoner swap that had been the thorniest issue of the armistice treaty. It confirms that the North Korean prisoners of war refused to return home wearing the clothes supplied by the U.S. army and stripped down to their underwear.

Some of those works overlapped with this year’s exhibits, including the portraits of artist Kim Yong-jun (1904–1967) and novelist Ri Ki-yong (1895–1984), a pioneer of KAPF(Federation of Korean Proletarian Artists) literature, as well as the etchings “Kumgang Mountain” and “Moran Peak.”
Byun did not produce portraits of famous people only. He also painted an anonymous girl in a red shirt wearing a shy smile, and a Korean student wearing a white dress shirt, as if to portray hope for the future. “Portrait of A.S. Hanshura, the Fisherman and Socialist Labor Hero” depicts a worker as a hero. These paintings are typical of socialist realism, which sought to depict subjects not necessarily the way they are, but how they should be. The family painting, in which his wife Cerbizova and his sons Alexandre and Sergey and daughter Olga as young children, is full of warmth, while the portrait of his mother makes viewers pause for a closer look. She passed away when Byun was young, and it was only in 1985, five years before his own death, that he decided to paint her. Her portrait was hanging on the wall in the middle of his studio and brought to Seoul for the exhibition.

The “Journey to Pyongyang” section had scenes of North Korea, including Sonjuk Bridge in Kaesong, Taedongmun (Great East Gate) and Moranbong (Moran Peak) in Pyongyang, and people doing laundry along the banks of the Taedong River. There is also a painting of a handsome pine tree. Some of these were painted during Byun’s stay in North Korea, but many were completed after his return to the Soviet Union, based on the sketches he had made there.

“Beach in Vladivostok” (1972). Etching, 36.7 x 90 cm. Prohibited from entering North Korea, Byun Wol-ryong visited Vladisvostok where he was born almost every year.

The “Landscapes of Diaspora” section featured the various places that Byun visited in Europe, Leningrad (now Saint Petersburg) after the 1960s, and Primorsky Krai, to which he returned every year. These paintings are notably serene and calm, suggesting that as a professor of a prestigious art school, he enjoyed the privilege of overseas travel and was able to spend his later years in relative comfort. However, his etchings, such as “Rain (Willow Tree)” (1971) and “Beach in Vladivostok” (1972), which depict turbulent winds as they ravage the branches of trees, appear to be expressing an unspoken message.

Byun’s sentiments toward his hometown in the Russian Far East and his fatherland, where he only briefly lived and never returned, seem to be silently conveyed in the signatures and titles in small Korean characters found in the corners of his paintings. In “North Korea Wholeheartedly Welcomes Koreans from Japan” (1960), which depicts the repatriation of Korean-Japanese to North Korea, an inscription in small letters reads: “I am painting in Leningrad with my mind on Chongjin, which I have never had a chance to visit.” Some of his other Russian portraits also have Korean inscriptions. Who were these notes for? Did he hope that someday his paintings would be recognized in both North and South Korea? Byun’s final words before his death from a stroke that he had suffered in 1985 were: “Write my name on my gravestone in Korean.” His request was honored with the clear engraving of “Byun Wol-ryong” in Korean on his tombstone when he was buried in Severnoye Kladbishche Cemetery in Saint Petersburg. Afterthoughts The large-scale retrospective was made possible by the efforts of art critic Moon Young-dae who, upon discovering Byun Wolryong’s artwork, conducted research on him and worked hard to make him known among Koreans. Moon went to Russia in 1994, four years after the normalization of relations between Korea and Russia, to study and was introduced to Pen Varlen’s art there. He was told by his advisor that Byun was Kareiski (Goryeoin, or ethnic Koreans in Russia and Central Asia) who had passed away a few years earlier. He searched for Byun’s family and finally was able to track down his second son Sergey, daughter Olga, and wife Cerbizova.

“Self-portrait” (1963). Oil on canvas, 75 x 60 cm. Although Byun painted numerous portraits of others, this is his only self-portrait, albeit unfinished.

Sergey had taken over his father’s studio, where many of Byun’s works were stored. Moon devoted the next 20 years to introducing Byun to Koreans. He has published two books: “Korean-Russian Artist Byun Wol-ryong and Letters from North Korea” (2004) and “Byun Wol-ryong: A Lost Genius Painter” (2012).
The contemporary art history of Korea after liberation from Japanese rule in 1945 has not been able to uncover all the missing links. The Pen Varlen Retrospective is thus a big step forward in helping to fill this void. However, the exhibition has left much to be desired. For example, few large-scale works that are representative of Byun’s art world were on view, except for “Planting Rice in Korea.” Noteworthy paintings like “The Pacific Fleet at Chongjin Port,” housed at the Central Navy Museum in Saint Petersburg, didn’t make it to Seoul; instead, it was shown in a miniature rep lica panel as part of the introductory timeline. To gain sufficient knowledge about Byun’s activities in the Russian art community as well as his influence on North Korea’s art history, we need to be more proactive in tracking down not only his masterpieces housed in major Russian institutions, but also the other works that are only known from photographs and whose whereabouts remain unknown. And then, we need to consider seriously how this artist and his works can be properly accommodated into Korea’s contemporary art history. The way that people responded to his paintings at the retrospective has convinced me that we have taken the first step in the right direction.

Legend of 100 Years — Other Masters
The exhibition was the first in a series of three retrospectives organized by the MMCA to mark the centennial of the birth of three modern Korean master painters. It will be followed by two others — for Lee Jung-seob (1916–1956, aka Yi Chung-sop), from June 3 to October 3, 2016; and Yoo Young-kuk (1916–2002), from October 21, 2016 to March 1, 2017. Lee is famous for his use of the unique medium of silver foil and familiar forms, as well as his short and tumultuous life story. Yoo Young-kuk, who studied painting at Bunka Gakuen [Cultural Institution] in Tokyo along with Lee, is deemed a pioneer of Korean abstract art