문화평론

Recent Exhibitions from a Latte-Chung Perspective

〈Tomorrow's Paradise LEE GIHUN: After Everything〉 at Groundseesaw East, a gallery in a multi-complex mall in Gwangjin-gu, Seoul, is the first original painting exhibition in Korea by artist Lee Gihun, who is gaining attention from some art circles and overseas galleries. It's gratifying to see young artists using their unique painting language based on solid fundamentals and gaining recognition in the global market.

In the past, art was a handmaiden of culture, mobilized as a means to propagate the legitimacy of political power and glorify dominant ideologies. This was especially true in Korea. While such practices led to all sorts of corruption, inverted values, and low-quality art in the art world, it's welcome to see young generations steadfastly unfolding their own worlds. There's a phenomenon where works are only re-examined in the domestic market after being recognized overseas, and also a trend where something ignored overseas spreads globally if Koreans prefer it. It's natural for people's minds to be swayed by conformity to others' perspectives or internalization of others' views as their own, but everything becomes a tragedy when taken to extremes.

Trends come and go, but the 'Mask Play' series, which projects future humans through masked animals, didn't give me the feeling of a terrifying prophecy or the desire to own a prophecy. While I could easily express my likes and dislikes, the price of the works was beyond imagination. I was pleased that Lee Gihun's genius seemed to be fully appreciated. Korea is a country that has long fostered a social atmosphere that eradicates genius. I hope for a future where all hidden masters can proudly raise their heads and command their true worth.

Review of the artwork

Was it a dark background and a heavy-hearted painting, or a print? It didn't come into clear focus. Only after I went closer and looked intently did I realize the immense brushstrokes, an unbelievable effort, and I could see the young artist striving for high concentration and expression. The background color, which contrasted with the red figures but didn't make them stand out, appeared repeatedly and caught my eye. These figures are not just striking colors. Contrasting with the dark and murky background, factory debris, power lines, hazy sky, surging waves, and eyeless pupils, the last survivors of an already vanished world help each other. The sight of those yet to come, holding umbrellas and waiting for the remnants of hope that have not yet disappeared, was a long-awaited emotional experience that brought tears to my eyes as I viewed the exhibition.

The texture created by watercolor and acrylic first laying down broad areas, with oil pastels layered on top, was much more intense than expected. The soft yet rough lines of the oil pastels didn't so much fix the forms clearly as they seemed to catch them just as they were about to dissipate. The surface, which seemed to retain the pressure and warmth of fingertips, had a completely different weight from digital images, and this weight, combined with the color red, made the artwork feel physically impactful beyond mere visual stimulation. While acrylic created flat, dry surfaces, oil pastels added a tactile layer on top. As lines overlapped, surfaces were rubbed, and sometimes marks were almost scratched on, the canvas transformed from a simple image into a material imbued with the traces of time and labor.

The materiality made the act of 'seeing' the work closer to the act of 'touching' it for the viewer. As one approached, the oil pastel particles became visible, and from a distance, these particles condensed into a single mass, pushing the red form more clearly. The red forms are mostly children wearing animal masks, or beings where animals and humans are intertwined. They walk through streets filled with water or ruined landscapes, holding fire, and embracing each other. The masks cover their faces, but at the same time, the gaze of those wearing the masks as they look at each other is sharp. The sight of children wearing animal masks feels like a camouflage technique for beings who must survive in the bizarre order created by the adult world.

The intertwined forms of sheep and rabbits, bears and fish, rabbits and fish, do not appear to be a part of nature, but rather the result of nature and humans devouring and being devoured by each other. The scenes of these forms crossing water, holding embers, and supporting each other's bodies evoke compassion, yet they also make one question what premise that compassion is based on. A narrative reminiscent of Noah's Ark permeated throughout the work, but the ark does not remain merely a symbol of salvation. The sight of children carrying life and walking through a landscape filled with rising water could have been interpreted as hope, but it leaves a suspicion that hope itself is already an institutionalized and manipulated story.

George Orwell was disparaged in his time

The suspicion naturally brought George Orwell to mind. The world Orwell depicted was a society that concealed the truth through surveillance, control, and the distortion of language. The era in which he lived, and the massacres of humanity that occurred before him, could only be expressed through the language of analogy and metaphor. In Lee Ki-hoon's work, it seemed as if masks were brought to life and functioned again. Masks conceal identity, but at the same time, the gaze of those wearing masks looking at each other creates a tension as if they are confirming and monitoring each other. They move forward step by step in a broken world, but it is unclear where that progress is headed. The title 'Tomorrow's Paradise' sounded even heavier amidst that uncertainty, and those walking towards that paradise, which has not yet arrived, stand amidst the ruins of today.

The artist's childhood experience of observing a landscape in the countryside where a national park and a massive cement factory coexisted is an important clue to understanding this ambivalent perspective. I was amazed by the way that landscape, where reverence for nature and the scars left by human development coexisted, was reborn in the work through the contrast between red forms and a dark background. The cohesion of that contrast was not merely a simple color contrast, but a device that revealed the inherent contradiction in how humans view nature. I hope that Lee Ki-hoon will be an artist who actualizes that genius in his artistic world and in reality. I hope he does not remain a misguided Korean, like the geniuses of previous generations who became complacent with their talent, fell for sweet talk, squandered their wealth, and wasted their time. I hope that his many intense brushstrokes become a warning and a window to the world, and a mirror that penetrates human selfishness. Korean society should be a society that welcomes many geniuses and gladly enjoys them. It should allow us to freely mock the ideological old-timers who disparage and sow discord out of envy and jealousy.

Social and environmental issues are not directly shouted out in the works. Instead, they permeate as background landscapes, movements of figures, and contrasts of colors. Children walking in a sky thick with factory smoke, a landscape crisscrossed with power lines, and streets filled with rising water simultaneously evoke the climate crisis and the remnants of industrial civilization. However, this evocation is not fixed in critical language. The texture created by the rough lines of oil pastels and the flat surfaces of acrylics makes viewers 'sense' the landscape rather than 'judge' it. The marks left by the pressure of fingertips are 'real' traces that digital images can never imitate, and these traces remind viewers of their own bodies. Who is the subject we are looking at? Have we never been conscious of the mask we are wearing? Isn't tomorrow's paradise ultimately built upon the remnants created by today's desires? These questions are not directly posed by the artwork but are rather questions that viewers ponder themselves while standing before the work.

Even after leaving the exhibition space, those red figures did not easily fade. The afterimage left behind the freshness and intensity of the technique is the perspective underlying the technique itself. A gaze that looks at society, ideology, and human desires beyond the singularity is refracted through masks and then condensed into red, placed before the viewer. These are works that allow us to re-experience a cross-section of the world we already live in, making us ponder what the faces hidden behind the masks are seeing, and where that gaze ultimately leads. Those questions did not easily disappear even after leaving the exhibition hall. Returning to the city amidst the afterimages left by the red figures that simultaneously offer countless conveniences and solitude, I reflected on how sad the lonely conveniences, indispensable to the daily lives of Koreans, make people. In the chilly weather that made me pull my collar tighter, the mask swayed slightly.