Artwork story
About Portrait of Yun Dongseom (1710–1795)
The artist and artwork
An unidentified Korean artist painted Portrait of Yun Dongseom around 1790–1805 as a hanging scroll in ink and color on silk. Yun was a Joseon scholar, calligrapher, and civil official. Although the scroll has no identifying inscription, the Met confirms him by comparison with two surviving portraits in Korean collections. Restrained shading describes his aging face and self-possessed presence.
The world around it
Yun belonged to the yangban, the official class that governed Joseon society alongside the king. Neo-Confucian study, self-cultivation, service, family hierarchy, and ancestor rites shaped that world. This painting was more than a likeness: it would have served as the centerpiece of a family shrine honoring male lineage. Its realism reflects late-eighteenth-century portrait practice while formal costume presents rank and moral authority to descendants.
A detail to notice
One accessory narrows the date. Yun wears a belt of rhinoceros horn and gold, reserved for officials of the second rank or above, a status he reached in 1790. If painted from life, the scroll belongs between 1790 and his death in 1795; it may instead be a posthumous portrait made within the next decade. Yun sits in three-quarter view on a high-backed chair draped with leopard skin. A pair of white cranes confront each other on his chest badge, a sign of high civil office amid clouds, waves, and rocks. Almost everything else is dark: hat, patterned robe, outer field. Against bare silk, his face, white collar, hands, socks, woven foot mat, and chair emerge slowly. The large blank ground supplies no distracting story, only a person whose rank and character were meant to remain present.
Look closer: materials, scale, and subjects
The recorded object is hanging scroll made in Hanging scroll; ink and color on silk and held in the Asian Art department.
Recorded dimensions include Image: 52 3/8 × 30 3/8 in. (133 × 77.2 cm); Overall with mounting: 76 × 31 in. (193 × 78.7 cm); Overall with knobs: 76 × 33 1/4 in. (193 × 84.5 cm).
Subject terms include Cranes, Men, and Portraits. Treat them as guideposts, not a complete interpretation.
Collection history and public-domain source
The collection credit line is Purchase, Harris Brisbane Dick and 2014 Benefit Funds; Friends of Korean Art, Locks Foundation, Hyun Jun M. Kim, and Tchah Sup and Myong Hi Kim Gifts, 2014.
The individual artwork page and official image were verified as Public Domain on 2026-08-23.
No Context Gallery independently uses the public-domain image. The source museum has not endorsed, sponsored, or affiliated itself with these products.
Research sources
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