The Korean contemporary artist Chun Kwang Young is presenting a solo show of new works at the Robert Miller Gallery in New York (until Oct. 11). Chun’s work uses an unusual combination of materials such as mulberry bark, Styrofoam and hand-made paper to create work that is a blend between painting, sculpture, memory and tradition:
. . . Chun has been using only natural colors extracted from fruit (green persimmon), flowers (gardenia seeds) and leaves, as well as black tea, yellow earth and chestnut shells. “Most of colors I have used are from polyganum indigo,” Chun said. “We can get red and brown colors from the fruits and flowers of polyganum and its leaves are used for blue.”
Chun’s preference for using natural dyes and handmade mulberry paper was born from childhood memories of his uncle’s pharmacy, where small medicinal herb parcels that were similarly wrapped with paper and hung in tight clusters from the ceiling in order to protect them from insects.
As per the IHT article on Chun’s work: “Chun’s printed words (inside the work), Klein added, become buried “so that the work resembles organic forms that often grow up from the ground. These crystallized boulders and monumental pods with irregular surfaces reference the natural landscape, which is deeply embedded in Korean art history, but are created from man-made modules made from both vintage and modern materials.”
The Robert Miller Gallery site is here.
{ 4 comments… read them below or add one }
Good to see one of the older Korean artists getting long overdue international attention.
it always warms my heart when I realize that I too will have to very old, nearly dead, or long dead and buried before I will get recognized as an innovative artist. Good for Chun Kwang-Young. Hope for me.
Trash.
Of course, I’m not dissing the artist, but the review…
You must log in to post a comment.