Le savoir en trompe-l’œil. Corée

A fascinating dive into the discovery of trompe-l'oeil art in Korea, between scholarly libraries and dreamlike worlds!

Royal, academic, or museal, the library remains a treasure trove of knowledge and escape. At the end of the 18th century in Korea, during the Joseon kingdom, King Jeongjo (r.

1776-1800) found in the contemplation of a library painting a way to remain symbolically surrounded by his books: a trompe-l’œil extending the spirit of the study cabinet, stimulating virtue, curiosity, and learned conversation.

Jeongjo then entrusted the painters of the Royal Academy with the creation of the first trompe-l’œil library paintings, installed in his study or even behind his throne. Korean embassies in Beijing played a decisive role.

Joseon envoys discovered Chinese treasure cabinets there, as well as the Jesuit art of perspective, disseminated at the Qing court and in the churches of the imperial capital by European artists.

The alliance between Chinese scholarly accumulation and European trompe-l’œil expertise nourished the inventiveness of Korean painters, who developed a singular use of perspective, chaekgeori.

Rapidly, this new art of books and objects spread to palaces, aristocratic residences, and provincial homes. Books, porcelains, archaizing bronzes, writing instruments, or objects from China, Japan, or the West accumulated there in a cleverly mastered play of optical illusions.

Far from European vanitas, these painted libraries do not refer to real collections, but to a cabinet of desires, to what one aspires to possess one day.

From the end of the 18th century, the book lost its scholarly value to become decorative; perspectives broke, forms distorted, fantastic animals appeared. The library moved away from reality to join a universe halfway between surrealism, fauvism, and oneirism.

For the first time at the Musée Guimet, an exhibition restores this pictorial movement to its central place,