Photos of the artworks and visitors to KAA’s recent exhibition at the Korean Cultural Centre UK. All photos by Miso Park ©misofactory.
Tag: Delayed Sojourn 2011
Exhibition review: Delayed Sojourn – London, home away from home
It was good to see the KCC so busy last Saturday afternoon. The attraction was the Korean Artists Association’s one-week exhibition: Delayed Sojourn – London, home away from home. And while there was plenty to enjoy inside, it was an unusual exhibit in the window that was drawing people in: 48 small glass bowls, each containing a small goldfish.
Entering the exhibition space was a calming experience: Soon Yul Kang’s hand woven tapestry Blue Moon (2011) welcomed you on the side wall,
while beyond were works by Joo-hee Chun (her abstract work built up with layers of acrylic) and Kitty Jun-im McLaughlin (her muted paintings based on hanji and calligraphy); and further on was an installation by Bada Song:
Song’s work was a tribute to Richard Serra’s Verb List Compilation: Actions to Relate to Oneself (1967-1968)
But her work was also in part an attempt to explore the Korean language – for Korean does not have words which are the direct equivalent of some on Serra’s list, for example “entropy”.
In the opposite corner of the space was something more down-to-earth:
Jean Kim’s Naked Journey is accompanied by a verse:
Long and winding roads
Off she goes
Naked as she is
Dancing to the city rhythms
Oh, here she comes
Naked as she is
In the multi-purpose space was a video projection and sculpture by Jung-gyun Chae:
The video contained interviews with members of the public about the nature of beauty and divinity. Chae himself gave an impromptu performance at the exhibition opening, holding up a protest placard containing the words 주먹이 운다 – in homage to Ryu Seung-wan’s Crying Fist – postcards of which line the reception of the KCC since the recent retrospective at the LKFF.
Hyeonseok Lee’s digital animations of Buddhist temple construction lined the video wall facing the street. Lee has just exhibited at the exhibition at Haeinsa celebrating 1,000 years of the Tripitaka Koreana.
At the end of the wall of video screens Joon Hwan Lim’s origami boats were pinned to the wall: an attempt to encapsulate the cultural diversity you find in London as an armada of tiny ships intermingling with each other.
Miso Park’s creative photographs took a more pessimistic view of the foreigner’s life in London, focusing on solitude, anonymity and the difficulty of managing their new life. In one work, a bewildered girl holds a duvet while waist-high in water, with the London skyline in the distance.
Shera Hyunyim Park gave a more naive, pastel-coloured view of London in her Memory of Richmond Park…
…while Unmi Lee’s collages of fabric and found objects presented a lively impression of West London.
In the final room the emphasis was on the crafts.
Myung Nam An’s Eyes dominated one of the walls…
…a selection of colourful porcelain items with shiny glaze – sea anenomes, artichokes and other delicately made circular objects.
Sun Kim’s ceramics were arranged against another wall, with delicately muted colours and matte surface…
… some of the items looked as if they could almost have been made out of carefully folded paper.
In the same room was a chandelier by Soo Ji Shin…
… with wisps of polypropylene paper sewn together like sails.
Returning back to the entrance along the video wall you were faced with Yonghyun Lim’s Oak Barrel inside which kaleidoscopic designs were projected, somewhat reminiscent of the Dr Who opening title sequence.
It was the end of the afternoon, and the 48 goldfish needed to be put to bed for the night. Young children were intrigued as Hyun Jun Kim carefully netted each fish one by one, putting them in a large bucket whence they could be safely deposited in a decent sized tank overnight to get some properly oxygenated water. The installation, entitled Swarm with Me by Hyun Jun Kim and Taeyoung Kim, represents the “personal journey of finding a home in London through the repetitive process of relocation.”
Delayed Sojourn – London, home away from home only lasted for a week, until 8th December. It’s a shame it couldn’t last longer, because it contains more of interest than many of the KCC’s longer-running shows. But maybe the fish will need a rest from being constantly on show.
This review was first published on London Korean Links.
Delayed Sojourn – London, home away from home
An annual exhibition by Korean Artists Association UK
Korean Cultural Centre UK
2nd – 8th December 2011
(Private view: Friday 02. 12. 2011, 6.30 – 8.30 pm)
RSVP to koreanartuk@gmail.com
Delayed Sojourn – London, home away from home represents 16 artists who have various background and diverse media, such as sculpture, painting, photography, film, design, textile, ceramic, architecture organised by KAA UK (The Korean Artists Association in UK).
Artists: Bada Song, Hyun Jun Kim, Hyunseok Lee, Jean Kim, Joohee Chun, Joon Hwan Lim, Jung-Gyun Chae, Kitty Jun-im McLaughlin, Miso Park, Myung Nam An, Shera Hyunyim Park, Soo Ji Shin, Soon Yul Kang, Sun Kim, Unmi Li, Yonghyun Lim (Jackie)
Bada Song
I use a range of media to build series in modules. This allows singularities to distinguish themselves from similar and gain identity through difference. For Delayed Sojourn I adapted this process to Korean language in a translation of the famous verb list deployed in 1968 by American sculptor Richard Serra.
Hyun Jun Kim
The installation of the fish bowls is accompanied by the notes and photographs. It speculates the personal journey to find a home in London through the repetitive process of relocation. It translates the trajectory of the homes into the suspended fish bowls where a fish swarms while keeping a constant distance to another. It creates the systematic illusion, the artificial cloud or the collective wish of ‘swarming-together’.
Hyunseok Lee
My art work as a form of animation narrative seeks to cross the boundary between reality and the abstract world, and is in some senses an ‘Animated Spiritual Documentary’. This artwork as a form of a short animation film, falls into four parts, each with a different content, with the final part moving from an interpretation of the spiritual journey and environment to a representation of a spiritual experience, I have focused on exploring the representation of the Buddhist’s philosophical principles and sacred experience by dramatising abstract and surreal environments.
Jean Kim
Long and winding roads
Off she goes
Naked as she is
Dancing to the city rhythms
Oh, here she comes
Naked as she is
Joohee Chun
I contain and seal my feelings and thoughts in the transparent layers of my paintings to create an ‘affect’ without the need for words. There are always spiritual inspiration, desire, hope which are suppressed any negative parts of my inner emotions in my painting to overcome current situation.
Joon Hwan Lim
There are many different people who were born different country and cultures, which have relationship each other in London. I re-interpreted such diversity to cultural flowing as various ships.
Jung-Gyun Chae
I am attempting to reinterpret Korean aesthetics by modernizing it via the Eastern mind by means of sculpture, installation and what I term “Film-Painting”. I started my work with painting but added projection of film on to sculpture later. This will become a coexistent place of meeting between the object and the film.
Kitty Jun-im McLaughlin
The essence of Kitty’s work derives from her integration of the duality of her experience of Korean and British culture, weaving them together to present an original and imaginative retelling of the influence of experience on the subject. The rich, tactile surfaces of her paintings, composed of rhythmic, linear elements cross the canvas in layers of Korean Hanji paper.
Miso Park
Many overseas students’; lives are suspended like dust in the air; they live with solitude, economic distress, anonymity and the difficulty of managing their new life. The project aims to highlight their mentality and illustrate the hardships of living in the UK. Issues of language, culture, society and emotional changes are addressed in Living Away From Home.
Myung Nam An
I want to express aspects of the human life using ceramic as an accessible way to tell stories about how unexpected changes, fate and luck affect our life. I want my own experience to have a universal meaning of existence as an artist. I intend to express who I am and how I came to be here, there was no past, present and future discernible, and it seemed to me that my work was flowing or waiting to move in one direction or another.
Shera Hyunyim Park
I found London is such a natural environment city especially bank-side landscape seem a frame of artwork as fantastic and dreamy natural image. Image transformed famous London landmarks to natural elements and those elements are combined together to create a frame of scene like artwork itself. Can you see the London Eye, Dali’s Elephants, Big Ben, Eros figure in Piccadilly Circus, Gherkin building and Millennium Bridge?
Soo Ji Shin
Chandelier – It is made by connecting of the many small boats, and it is like a cluster of them. It looks as if the cluster is flying to the sky. It is also made by hand- sewing. (lighting)
Soon Yul Kang
My works are concerned with contemplation inspired by nature and Zen. My images have a timeless aspect to them and convey to the viewer a sense of tranquility and mystical form. The use of a circle in my works conveys a sense of immortality and of an on-going journey. Coming to London was for me the beginning of a new life and that is a journey is still on-going.
Sun Kim
My work is focused on a range of functional ware where I explore traditional and contemporary aesthetics. I use porcelain and also stoneware as the main material to produce my work. I’m very intrigued by cultural connections I find within my work and the making process is a continual challenge for me and a personal investigation into form, shape and volume.
Unmi Li
My work illustrates my growing awareness of a vibrant multicultural city; its hopes and fears expressed in London.
Yonghyun Lim (Jackie)
When I arrived in London the city was like a fairy tale, it inspired me to photograph it, to sketch it and to write about it. Big Ben, London Eye and the river Thames were like scenes from a fairy tale, something that I had dreamt of since I was a child, my dream had come true and I was very excited. After numerous beers it was much more appealing.
Exhibition Committee: Soon Yul Kang, Hyun Jun Kim, Miso Park, Joon Hwan Lim
Exhibition Director: Bada Song
Korean Cultural Centre UK
General enquiries: info@kccuk.org.uk
Grand Buildings, 1-3 Strand, London WC2N 5BN
(Entrance in Northumberland Avenue)
Opening Times: Mon to Fri 10 am – 5 pm
Saturday 11 am – 4 pm
Enquiries on this exhibition: koreanartuk@gmail.com
The Korean Artists Association UK
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