Chang Uc-chin's rare 'Family' painting returns from Japan after 60 years

A painting by renowned Korean artist Chang Uc-chin (1917-1990) titled "Family" has returned to South Korea 60 years after Japanese collector Shiozawa Sadao bought it in 1964 at Chang's first solo exhibition in Seoul. The painting, the first piece the artist sold, is known to have been cherished by the artist, who placed the painting by his bedside. With the money he earned by selling the painting, he bought a violin for his daughter.

The whereabouts of the painting had been unknown until the painting was recently found in a storage closet in the collector's former atelier in Japan, according to the National Museum of Modern and Contemporary Art, Korea. The collector had died in 2003. The painting is among some 30 paintings that depict a family by the artist, and is the sole painting that shows a father and children without a mother unlike his other family paintings.

The painting will be unveiled to the public at the artist's retrospective, "The Most Honest Confession: Chang Ucchin," at the MMCA, which will kick off on Sept.14.