The Sound of Wind and Traces (2019-2020)
Under the title, The Sound of Wind and Traces is an exhibition presents series of works that embody my hope of nurturing our wounds we face in life, just as sharp wire fences could turn into soft lines—free and liberated in the realm of art. These paintings were born through a contemplation on what kind of feelings and attitudes I have about the wounds that everyone lives with, and how I can heal the emotional memories throughout the course of life.
As years passed, I realized that one’s life consists of two types of memories. When something presents itself as happiness, later it turns out to be sadness, or something that is unfortunate later manifests as a fortune. At times, an event that seemed like an accident ends up feeling like destiny–and these opposing forces are inextricably intertwined in our lives.
Another truth I found was that even though bodies age, our hearts stay young and we wish to keep falling in love. As there is an end to every beginning, we wish to make the most of every moment. There’s a long and winding road ahead that life has laid out, but since nobody can walk it for us, we should eat well and overcome the mountains and mountains of obstacles.
Everybody lives with their own wounds. While I used to express my struggles from my own wounds, I have found that one’s attitude towards wounds and wounds themselves are separate entities. Perhaps this is the reason why some people give way to pain while others become stronger, although they suffer from similar things. I had always tried to endure any wounds and get back on my feet, rather than bracing myself against any possible pain while gritting my teeth. A realization came to me: my attitude towards pain shapes who I am.
My recent work transgresses the border between abstraction and representation. While my body of work during the last decade were drawn in order to forget painful experiences, the current series is more akin to the process of undressing an infected wound and taking a closer look at it—as if to face the painful feelings I had attempted to cover up. While repeating the process of drawing, scraping off and erasing small wounds on canvases, I felt the uneasiness that arises when every secret feeling that had once been suppressed is revealed. The process of erasing and covering up canvases curiously resembles the process of healing. In the end, what was left on the canvases were abstractions, like traces of wounds as what began with drawing the wire fences of the DMZ sparked a series of works; The Sound of Wind, Scar, and Traces. Along the way, my thematic attention naturally extended from wounds of mind to wounds of body, which leaded to the works of Vestiges of Time as well as Memories into the Future.
As years passed, I realized that one’s life consists of two types of memories. When something presents itself as happiness, later it turns out to be sadness, or something that is unfortunate later manifests as a fortune. At times, an event that seemed like an accident ends up feeling like destiny–and these opposing forces are inextricably intertwined in our lives.
Another truth I found was that even though bodies age, our hearts stay young and we wish to keep falling in love. As there is an end to every beginning, we wish to make the most of every moment. There’s a long and winding road ahead that life has laid out, but since nobody can walk it for us, we should eat well and overcome the mountains and mountains of obstacles.
Everybody lives with their own wounds. While I used to express my struggles from my own wounds, I have found that one’s attitude towards wounds and wounds themselves are separate entities. Perhaps this is the reason why some people give way to pain while others become stronger, although they suffer from similar things. I had always tried to endure any wounds and get back on my feet, rather than bracing myself against any possible pain while gritting my teeth. A realization came to me: my attitude towards pain shapes who I am.
My recent work transgresses the border between abstraction and representation. While my body of work during the last decade were drawn in order to forget painful experiences, the current series is more akin to the process of undressing an infected wound and taking a closer look at it—as if to face the painful feelings I had attempted to cover up. While repeating the process of drawing, scraping off and erasing small wounds on canvases, I felt the uneasiness that arises when every secret feeling that had once been suppressed is revealed. The process of erasing and covering up canvases curiously resembles the process of healing. In the end, what was left on the canvases were abstractions, like traces of wounds as what began with drawing the wire fences of the DMZ sparked a series of works; The Sound of Wind, Scar, and Traces. Along the way, my thematic attention naturally extended from wounds of mind to wounds of body, which leaded to the works of Vestiges of Time as well as Memories into the Future.
Gaston Bachelard remarked that memory is a strange thing, as it does not record a concrete duration. We’re unable to relive those fragments of time in our memories, and instead we can only reimagine a past occurrence as an indistinct extension of an abstract sense of time.Lines and colors are like memories that are intricate and unable to define. No single line stays the same space, and no single color is bound by the same image, but they move on to another series of images.
They function as the medium that connects the world outside the canvas, allowing me to recall my memories and feelings. I hoped that any bruises in my mind, which had been uncomfortable for me to face, could be healed through the acts of drawing. And it crossed to my mind that working on The Sound of Wind and Traces, striving mentally and physically, perhaps I was performing a ritual to soothe spirits who might be waiting for us outside of time.
