Kim Uju's wildflowers began in a childhood field — plants that grew where no one had sown. From field notes to oil painting, a *Wildflower Collage* season.
For Kim Uju, wildflowers began in the pages of a plant guide.
"I grew up in a remote countryside and was close to nature, and I also had a lot of field-labor experience. Planting pepper seedlings or beans was part of my childhood routine. One day I saw unnamed wildflowers I had not planted growing around the field. Unlike weeds, they came to me differently, and it became a pleasure to look them up in the plant guides in my father's study."
The memory was forgotten for a time, and later — after she came to Seoul as an adult — grows again on the artist's surface.
Hongik Painting, MFA Through PhD
Kim Uju completed her MFA in painting at Hongik University Graduate School in 2013 and finished PhD coursework at the same school in 2024. Nearly ten years of accumulated painting research inside one institution.
Two solos. Pictorial Impulse at PiaLuxART Gallery (2016) and Wildflower Season 1 at Hongik University Museum of Contemporary Art (2023). The "season 1" in the title signals a long-term project composed as seasons. A declaration: this will not end in one exhibition.
An Emerging Artist's Trajectory
Recent group-show records place the artist.
- 2024 Seoul Emerging Artist Discovery Project , Seunhwal Hall
