Education
He entered into Dosan School and met an art teacher named Lim Yongryeon who had studied art at Yale University and worked as an artist in Paris. Born on 1916, He entered Teikoku Art School for Occidental Painting in Japan in 1932 and studied Art in earnest. He graduated from Bunka Gakuen in 1944 during the last stage of World World War II, and married Masako the following year.
Career
He was affected by Lim Yongryeon who emphasized drawing. But he abruptly quit that school and entered Bunka Gakuen (Japanese: 文化學園), which was more fascinated with the avant-garde than Teikoku Art School. He showed Fauvist tendencies and a strong and free drawing style at Bunka Gakuen.
Taking this event, he sent his painting "A Child Flies with a White Star", which was inspired by his loss, to the exhibition commemorating the independence of of Korea in 1947.
Following the outbreak of the Korean War, he didn’t settle one place and instead wandered the country. But with a fear of the progress of war, he fled to Jeju.
After that, he never met his family except for a short meeting for 5 days in Tokyo in 1953. He came to Seoul with returning to the capital.
He held only one private exhibition at the Midopa gallery in 1955.
After that, he suffered from a type of schizophrenia credited to longings for his family and the hardships of his life. In his loneliness, he turned to alcohol and died of hepatitis in 1956 in Seoul. His style was influenced by Fauvism and his themes were very characteristic and indigenous.
He made great contributions to the introduction of western styles in of Korea.
Also he made line drawings with an awl on packs of cigarettes. To honor his great artworks, in 1995, Lee Jung Seob Art Gallery was built at the center of the so-called "Lee Jung-Seob"s Art Street" (a part of Olle Route 6) in Seogwipo, Jeju, which holds a geographically significant meaning for many of his artworks in that he left some of the greatest paintings in the history of Korean modern art during his stay at Seogwipo.