My paintings show simplicity, sincerity, and authenticity like Milton Avery and Philip Guston. The materials I choose, such as oil pastels and oil sticks, give viewers a sense of intimacy when they see the paintings. With my paintings, I show how contemporary film and literature with distinct characteristics are reduced down to uniform colors when processed through consumer culture.
Recently, I’m working on the Explosion project based on Japanese and American animation from the 1970s to the 1990s. Just as I drew with crayons on the back of calendars in my childhood, I paint with oil sticks on canvas. I was born in South Korea and South Korea has histories with Japan and the United States. There were genocides, sex slaves, and lethal human experimentations by Japan during the colonial period. During that time, My grandfather went to college in Japan, and my mother also majored in Japanese in her college. In addition, most people know that South Korea got economic aid from the United States after the Korean War. It had an impact on my family, too. While my maternal line has something to do with Japan, my father has been teaching English for decades in South Korea. Because of this background, I had spent my childhood watching foreign animations imported from the United States and Japan. The subtle relationship between Korea, Japan, and the United States and the reality that I’m living as an Asian in the United States appear as the subject of Explosion in my works like I scribbled with crayons in my childhood. So this project is about my memories of childhood as well as the historical and cultural conflicts that I am currently experiencing in the contemporary world.
People experience various conflicts and collisions today like me. While Explosions show confusion, they also play a role in erasing it cleanly. I try to provide a clue to solving various conflicts that exist in the contemporary world through the energy of the explosion. Through my paintings, viewers can resolve internal conflicts and experience sublime, majesty, and catharsis.
