By Kelli Donigan
Contributing Writer
A Korean volunteer and interpreter for G.O.A.'L who helps to translate and interpret for adoptees searching for their birth families on a KBS show called ``I Miss You,'' and a long-time friend of many Korean adoptees living in Seoul, Choi Eun-seong will hold her art exhibition this month in Itaewon at ``GreemZip,'' a local art gallery. The exhibition will run daily from 2 p.m.-10 p.m. through March 28 to April 1.
Her latest collection of eight paintings entitled ``Being in an Unfamiliar Place'' takes a more mature and narrative approach compared to her previous abstract paintings. While her artwork has evolved, her philosophy to art has remained unchanged, that is, she still tries to approach art in accordance with how she perceives relationships between herself and others as well as her relationship with her surroundings.
One group in particular that has had a strong influence on her relationships is Korean adoptees living in Korea. Six years ago, overseas Korean adoption was an unfamiliar novelty to her, but she became more curious about overseas Korean adoptees and their lives as she befriended them. After spending a lot of time with them, she found her own life perspective slowly changing. She came to realize that feelings of loneliness, estrangement, and isolation that adoptees face in Korea were not exclusively theirs, but that of everyone's. She understood it to be a part of human nature and therefore inevitable.
In many of her new paintings, she tries to give voice to the issue of Korean adoption by expressing the feelings related to discrimination and the complexity over what is it like to be adopted, moreover, what it is like to be human. In the portrait entitled "Made in Korea,'' Choi depicts an adoptee, drawn as a marionette sitting on a dresser in red high heels, who has been reduced to a mere object. She was moved after hearing one adoptee's story about their adoptive mother who thought international adoption was similar to importing furniture.
Her soft color schemes and images are alluring and mystical. While some of the symbolic objects like the horse, the unicorn or the balloon-like flower depicted in her paintings are either coming out of a door, leaping into the air, or bellowing in the air, we, the spectators, are tempted to do the opposite. There is an urge to leap into these paintings and try to envision what Choi had set out to draw.
Many of her new paintings are her reflections on post-modernism and trying to find one's identity and place in modern life, especially in Korea's fast-paced and globally, competitive society. These paintings not only reveal the psychological and emotional aspect of the human condition, but also a personal narrative of stories, connections and relationships.
Her personal visual narrative has just begun but we anticipate seeing more of it in her future artwork as she hopes to include her travels and other experiences.