Jo Sinuk carries the Joseon *chaekgado* tradition into today. Inside the grid: his own daily fragments, the extraordinary inside the ordinary.
Joseon-era chaekgado (冊架圖) stood in for a scholar's room.
Books, mun-bang-sa-u (the four treasures of the study), a vase, a clock, a foreign ceramic, a stone — neatly arranged on a shelf. What one reads and cares about shows through the arrangement of objects. Jo Sinuk brings this traditional genre back into his own daily life. Inside the grid of his canvas, instead of books, sit fragments of one person living today.
Holding Life
In 2022, Jo Sinuk held Chaekgado — Holding Life at Kimpo CICA Museum and Seoul Gallery Nut. In 2025, it extended to Seoul Gallery Hwal as Chaekgado — Landscape of Life. A series translating the traditional form into contemporary sensibility — deepening as the years pass.
"The daily fragments that compose my life each reveal their own shape and color within each work's space, turning ordinary moments into something extraordinary. The extraordinary moment in my life is the moment of finding beauty and joy within the ordinary. The moment that joy takes life in the work."
That is the artist's manifesto. The extraordinary doesn't come from outside but is found within the ordinary. Each object inside the chaekgado grid is evidence of that discovery.
A Road That Started at Incheon Catholic University
Graduating from Incheon Catholic University's painting department in 2018, he had begun solo exhibitions already from 2015. Jo Sinuk Exhibition at Cyart Space (2015), Another Me at Film Forum Gallery (2017), Color of Light (2019). In 2021, invited to MANIF 2021 — Art Figuratif at the Seoul Arts Center.
In 2024, he extended through group exhibitions — Connect international exhibition at Kimpo CICA Museum, micro.tele.scope at Film Forum Gallery. In April that year, he participated in the Sewol Ferry 10th Anniversary Memorial Exhibition (Art Forum Ri); in 2025, the 11th Anniversary Memorial Exhibition (4.16 Life Safety Training Center). The chaekgado grid doesn't hold only individual happiness.
Awards, Open Calls, and Consistency
Jo Sinuk's record shows a dense pattern of open calls and awards. In 2025 alone: Special Selection at the Korea Healing Art Exhibition; Chair of Seoul Metropolitan Council Award at the Seoul International Art Exhibition; Bronze Prize at the Starbucks Painting Open Call. 2023 Gwanghwamun International Art Festival Open Call selection (Sejong Center Museum), Green Prize at the Art Korea Art Exhibition, Special Selection at the Korea Creative Art Exhibition. In 2022, Special Selection at the Art Challenger Open Call, Silver Prize at the Republic of Korea Culture and Art Exhibition.
A consistency of expanding the stage through open calls as an emerging artist. That consistency itself becomes another grid in his chaekgado.
Leaving the Room, and Chaekgado with a Boat
Two works contributed to SAF 2026.
- Leaving the Room — watercolor on paper, 2022
- Chaekgado with a Boat — acrylic on canvas, 2025
Both are 60.6×60.6 cm square. The grid structure of chaekgado stands clearly. A way of filling an old form with today's objects and scenes. His practice is a bridge suspended between tradition and the present.
SAF as Another Cell
Jo Sinuk contributes two works to SAF 2026. SAF's main exhibition opens at Insa Art Center's G&J Gallery; he is already slated to contribute there as well.
84.9% of Korean artists are excluded from institutional finance. Sales of works by SAF-exhibiting artists cycle into a mutual-aid fund, returning as low-interest loans to fellow artists.
Among the "extraordinary joys found inside the ordinary" the artist speaks of, one could be the ordinary joy of a peer artist's overdue electricity bill getting settled. What enters the chaekgado cell need not be a precious thing. It is enough if it carries one through the day.
The Work of Making a Cell
Jo Sinuk's chaekgado is not a finished form but an ongoing one.
Each exhibition adds a new cell, and old cells are painted over in other colors. That is how one person's daily life grows, and how one artist's world enlarges. SAF 2026 is another cell newly opening in his chaekgado.
Works by Jo Sinuk
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Seed Art Festival
Published April 20, 2026
