My paintings conflate two main aspects of my experience: the intimacy, domesticity and emotional depth of living and loving, and the contextualization of my Korean heritage within the Western communities I have lived in. I create spaces that are somewhere between the home and the body, places that are not completely real or entirely false. This semi autobiographical space bridges my experiences and wishes for what could be, a suspended moment in time that is activated once paint hits the surface.
The domestic and natural environment act as a platform from which I can recount memories and explore the possibility of new ones. I use a personal vocabulary of symbols to explore repeated reactions or desires: door frames and windows as portals of emotional access, the moon and man-made light sources as uncertainty, and water as presence of heightened emotion. This categorization of visual elements allows me to interpret my life and formulate areas of therapeutic reflection.
Having only grown up in Western communities, my grasp of Korean culture has been obtained solely through third party sources, such as my family, the internet and public documentaries. As an attempt to recontextualize myself, I fabricate painting surfaces out of home or thrifted bedsheets, stitched together with traditional Korean textile methods. This harmony between Western-found fabrics and Korean fabrication visualizes the two cultures, Korea and Enlgand, that live within me.
The domestic and natural environment act as a platform from which I can recount memories and explore the possibility of new ones. I use a personal vocabulary of symbols to explore repeated reactions or desires: door frames and windows as portals of emotional access, the moon and man-made light sources as uncertainty, and water as presence of heightened emotion. This categorization of visual elements allows me to interpret my life and formulate areas of therapeutic reflection.
Having only grown up in Western communities, my grasp of Korean culture has been obtained solely through third party sources, such as my family, the internet and public documentaries. As an attempt to recontextualize myself, I fabricate painting surfaces out of home or thrifted bedsheets, stitched together with traditional Korean textile methods. This harmony between Western-found fabrics and Korean fabrication visualizes the two cultures, Korea and Enlgand, that live within me.