Nam Kyeu

Biography

His nickname was “Butterfly Nam”, in Korean Nam Nabi. It stuck because for almost his whole life he painted butterflies, insects and flowers, and painted them in a way that his contemporaries remembered above all.

Nam Kyeu was born in 1811, the eleventh year of the reign of King Sunjo, into the family of an official, Nam Jinhwa. The family belonged to the Uiryeong clan. He was a fifth-generation descendant of Nam Gu-man, a high official in the time of King Sukjong. His origins also shaped his position: he was not a professional craftsman-painter but lived as an educated man from a family of officials. He lived and worked in Seoul, in a district that sources call Namchon. He served in office himself: he held a rank of the third grade, while by other accounts he was attached to the court painting academy, the Dohwaseo. How this service related to his painting is hard to tell from the materials available to me; the texts I have contain no documents about his posts, and I would not build far-reaching conclusions on them.

His paintings are known mostly by their titles. They include “Paired Scrolls of Flowers and Butterflies”, “Paired Scrolls of Rocks, Flowers and Butterflies”, “Butterflies and a Cat among Flowers”, “A Swarm of Butterflies on Autumn Grass”, “A Swarm of Butterflies” and a composition called “Striking with a Fan” (Gyeokseondo). The titles show that his subject stayed the same and only its components changed: flowers, rocks, autumn grass, and sometimes a cat, which in the Korean tradition often appears alongside a butterfly.

He also wrote poetry. Surviving works include the collections “Eight Songs of Padam” and “Eight Songs of Fields and Gardens”, as well as a book of critical notes on ancient poetry. For a painter from the circle of literate officials this was a usual combination, but here it is confirmed by the titles of the surviving writings.

The date of his death differs between sources: 1888 is named more often, while other accounts give 1890 (the twenty-seventh year of King Gojong’s reign). The exact date is unknown. His places of birth and death are not given in the available materials.