Q1. Hello, I have long enjoyed your work, which constantly finds subject matter in familiar, everyday landscapes. Your solo exhibition <Fresh and Pointed Eggplant> (2024) marks your return to gallerychosun after seven years since <Very Green> in 2017. I’m sure this means a lot to you. While both exhibitions share a common thread; a deep observation of the things that surround you, they differ in content.
As the title suggests, your solo exhibition <Very Green> (2017), largely depicted the rice paddies, fields, and the mountains seen near your studio. The spectrum of green presented in the paintings, similar yet distinct, depicting the diverse densities and layers of nature. In that sense, the work could be described as a macroscopic view of nature.
In contrast, your new exhibition shifts towards a microscopic perspective, focusing on more intimate, close-up subjects. Your works – flowers arranged in vases, portraits of friends suggest a return from distant nature to the immediacy of what’s nearby. I’m curious, what prompted this shift? Was there a particular reason behind it?
There have always been subtle shifts in the subjects I paint, as well as my technique. I think I’ve naturally moved in cycles, although others might not notice so easily. I have always considered myself as someone who draws. Consequently, I often catch myself looking around, wondering What should I draw? Why do I draw at all? My life as an artist has been so long, it feels like all my responses are those of a person who draws
I feel like I have become more like that since <Very Green> in 2017. In a sense I started to draw as an answer. Maybe it’s something that comes with age; the shift from asking questions to answering them. After the exhibition, I continued to paint various landscapes. Green ones, winter scenes, and even seascapes. And then, something I had long held in my heart came forward. I wanted to paint flowers.
Still objects and flowers are such classical subjects, depicted by countless artists over time for their beauty. That weight of tradition made the idea of painting them intimidating. But eventually, I decided to take the leap. I began painting flowers from my own garden, arranged in vases I’ve collected over the years as a hobby. It just felt right, like something I should do if it were my work. My approach towards painting people was much like how I approached the flowers and vases.
I hope to always remain aware of myself as a living being. As someone who is always asking and answering questions. Even now, as I write this response, I feel a shift underway, a new current pulling me in a different direction. It feels like the right moment for it too, almost as if I’ve been waiting for it. Though, again, perhaps no one else would notice.
Q2. The shift in your painting subjects from natural landscapes like mountains to portraits and flowers share a significant commonality when viewed more broadly. They are all finite and ever-changing. Landscapes, though seemingly constant, transform endlessly between day and night, from season to season. In a way, everything is subject to change under the flow of time. However, I wonder, what draws you to subjects that are particularly finite? Those that have a life? What meaning do these subjects have in your paintings? And more broadly, what is the most important factor when it comes to choosing the subject of your work?
You’re absolutely right – ‘Finite and ever-changing’. For some reason I feel a certain tenderness toward such things. As if I could do something for them, or even that I must. I’m really not interested in other worlds. I don’t understand them. But these things, I believe they all carry stories. Some of them reach out to me, as if they’re asking a question. It’s like they’re announcing their presence by shining. When that happens, I feel an urge to respond. To find an answer to their question or to gather those shining moments. That’s where my paintings come from. That’s where they live.
Q3. Unlike the portraits and floral works displayed in the basement of the gallery, the second floor featured your ‘Text Painting’ series, developed simultaneously with your book. Hung in a single line with equal spacing between them, the paintings resemble lines of poetry, each work holding its place like a stanza, forming a rhythm across the wall. You also published a book of the same title as the exhibition, which makes me curious. As a person who is interested in the relationship between text and image, how does the presence of text alter the way a painting functions, compared to when an image stands alone? Within a single frame, how do images and language relate to one another? In your working process, does one typically come before the other? And also, are there strategies you use to either narrow or widen the distance between the two?
Text Paintings, a series that has felt more like a kind of “play”, has been ongoing since 2003. In that sense, it’s probably the longest-running body of work I’ve made. As the format suggests, these are paintings that include simple illustrations and clumsy lettering, visually referencing posters made by children. But while children’s posters tend to have a clear purpose of message, my works diverge from that point. The relationship between text and image may be insignificant, or may not. It’s hard to say. When words and images are presented together, it’s almost impossible to not look for meaning. This ambiguous point is where my work lies. I’ve long been someone who loves literature, and I think it wouldn’t be an exaggeration to say that much of my work begins from that place. I sometimes wonder, perhaps what I’m ultimately trying to make is something close to a poem. That poetic impulse, the feeling of reading or writing poetry – is probably what sustains me, and what allows me to keep working.
People often ask which comes first in this series, text or image. Sometimes the words come first (whether from books or other places), while other times the image comes first (similarly to text, from things I happen to pass by). They sometimes even arise together, or I’ll experiment with combining seemingly unrelated elements. Treating improvisation as a mystery sauce in work creates satisfactory pieces, but of course some are simply discarded. Hence, my work often begins from the state of “I’m not sure yet if it's finished”. This series didn’t take particularly more time to create, at least not in terms of brushwork. I prefer the work to remain raw and unfinished. But I wouldn’t call them esquisse or sketches either. It may be an odd way to put it, but I would like each piece to feel like a simple, unpretentious, sincere bowl of noodles.