Space is the place: Kim Dong Yoon, Lee Jeong bae
Kim once opened a book at random and read a line by Konparu Zenchiku: To escape forgetting, that is the embodiment of the past. As he closed it, the Tucson sunset faded. He wondered if someone else was watching it now.
Kim DongYoon stood to write a reply:
“I don’t know about you, but I think an exhibition with Lee Jeong bae would be valuable.”
He had never met Lee in person. He had only seen his works during a residency. For him, the people mattered in an exhibition. Thinking about his own earlier series, 《Memory》, he felt that Lee’s work held a different emotional depth. 《Memory》 focused on shared memories, choosing public places like playgrounds and intersections. Lee, on the other hand, chose ordinary places but revealed what was hidden within them.
Lee Jung bae sat in a café, slightly tired. He was meeting a curator to discuss an exhibition. He had parked near a gallery with permission, so he felt at ease.
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“I’ve heard about you from Kim DongYoon. Shall we sit here?” The curator asked how his early work has changed into his current practice.
As Lee wondered where to begin, the table bell rang.
“I’ll get it,” the curator said.
Yuja tea and milk. An unusual order for a coffee shop. Lee smiled, moved the tea aside, and opened his laptop. When speaking about his early work, he recalled a rock he once drew at Sogeumgang river. He had wanted that rock so badly, even until this day. It was also when he first faced his own desire. It took him three years to understand what that feeling meant. Over time, he realised that social injustice could not be resolved by personal desire alone, and this led him to question capital.
His printed photographs showed quiet cityscapes. Yet what he wanted to reveal was the forced presence of nature buried within developed urban scenes. He created relief sculptures based on fragments of nature from his photographs and displayed them together.
The curator, who had been listening quietly, asked,
“Do you have a beautiful memory that you could share?”
The question felt sudden. Lee struggled to think of one.
“If it’s hard, think of a moment you’d like to return to,” she said with a smile.
He remembered the sound of swallows in spring, warm morning light, and the image of someone he loved. Just as he began to explain, his phone rang.
“Just a moment.”
Twenty-three years ago, Tucson felt different. The heat above 35℃ persisted, but now it felt unfamiliar to Kim. Returning to photograph the Arizona city of his youth, he found that time had transformed it. Whereas his previous work focused on memory, this time the city itself took centre stage.
Tucson represented his childhood. Despite living most of his schooling in Seoul, it was his first foreign city. Giant cacti, the blazing sun, the desert. Each time he raised his camera, he noticed subtle changes from his memories.
On the flight back to London, he recalled the M1 motorway, once key to Britain’s industry. He had expected striking scenery but instead found flat factory zones and felt disappointed. The once glorious road now feeling neglected, much like Tucson, had transformed from childhood haven to a forgotten tourist spot.
The essence of a place’s memory requires time. Kim decided to film the M1 landscape.
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“It was the first time swallows built a nest there,” Lee said after finishing his call.
He had grown up in Seoul. Morning sunlight through windows, birdsong, quiet walks with loved ones. To him, nature was open and unrestricted, complete in itself. He once felt that same wholeness not in nature, but in a person. When that memory overlapped with the sight of nature squeezed between apartment buildings, he made sculptures that traced the hidden natural forms behind artificial structures.
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Kim, driving along the M1, saw a sign for Doncaster and turned instinctively. Like many European cities, London had grown around churches and this small town was no exception. A modest church stood amidst the grey winter, bare branches brushing his coat as he stepped out. It seemed ancient and destined to remain in memory.
Kim DongYoon lifted his camera and pressed the shutter toward the church.
Text by Jung Dakyung (Gallery Chosun)
Translated by Gallery Chosun