TROPICAL FOREST

Artist Statement

Innate Color and the World of the Unconscious: An Inquiry into Being and Harmony Creation goes beyond an act of mere expression; it becomes a process of recording one's thoughts and emotions. Leaving a touch on the canvas every day accumulates, like a diary, the artist's philosophy and aesthetic inquiry, and the work that shifts through the passage of time functions as a vital element guiding life itself. The starting point of this record was my time studying abroad in Japan. The experience of living within another culture is closely tied to the process of establishing one's own identity. Among people of varied cultural backgrounds, instead of assimilating, I formed an attitude of holding even more firmly to my own color, and this was directly reflected in my work. The pursuit of preserving one's own color also influenced my pictorial method. Rejecting the traditional techniques of oil painting, I worked without using oil and instead laid the paint thickly onto the canvas in its innate color, emphasizing the very being of color itself. On the surface it appears that several colors are mixed together, but a closer look reveals that each color exists in its own form and yet harmonizes with the others. This can be understood as a way of exploring, on an ontological level, the boundary between individuality and relationality. The working process operates on a similar principle. Composing the picture without sketching, following the unconscious, does not deliver a planned narrative; rather, the work allows the narrative within the unconscious to surface. This may look like an instinctive, improvisational way of working, but in the end it is a process of interpreting an inner current and giving it visual form. In particular, the beings on the canvas are divided between those that appear directly and those expressed metaphorically; the indirect mode of expression is tied to a will to protect the strange yet lovable moments discovered within. The fact that these beings appear in the form of animals rather than humans reflects an attitude of preserving purity and individuality as instinctive existence. After returning to Korea, the experience of personal loss brought a change in my way of working. Working at the Sulmijae Museum of Art, I moved toward a more thorough deconstruction of the relationship between color and form. Beings that had previously appeared rather clearly were now hidden more deeply within intense color and rough brushwork through new thinking, new directions, and corresponding material experiments, drawing the viewer to actively search the surface in order to find the narrative. This is more than a visual exploration; it can be seen as an attempt to reconsider presence and absence. In 2025, the work that began after my move to Yangpyeong is entering yet another phase. This is not merely a spatial change but can be understood as a process in which the unconscious beings re-engage with the world. Ultimately, the question of whether innate color and being can maintain their essence while entering relationship with the other will continue to be explored through my work. Within the process of expanding the boundaries of color and being, of harmony and individuality, I hope to share a new visual experience with the viewer.