Foreign Artists Solo Exhibitions in Seoul
By Cathy Rose A. Garcia
Staff Reporter
Seoul's art scene is seeing a bit of foreign flavor this month, with solo exhibitions by Chinese artist Ye Yongqing, British artist Keith Tyson and Japanese artist Toeko Tatsuno.
Ye, a prominent Chinese artist, is holding a solo exhibition ``Heartful Bird'' at Gallery Artside, Insa-dong. The exhibition, which features his distinctive scribbled bird paintings, runs through Dec. 4.
Kwon Hyuck-chu, curator of Gallery Artside, said when Ye paint birds, he does so ``as if he is expressing his own mind.'' ``The artist first draws paintings on small notebooks with simplicity and then enlarges the drawings by projecting them onto the wall with a beam projector. Then, he creates the contour as if he is scratching lines on the enlarged drawing and the Chinese ink fills the empty space created by the contour,'' he said, in the exhibition catalogue.
Ye, born in Kunming, Yunna province, and a prominent figure in China's art scene was a leading member of the Southwest Art Group during the 1985 ``New Wave Arts Movement.''
Ye's works displayed at Gallery Artside may look simple like a child's random scribbles, but upon closer scrutiny, look exquisite. Through his works, Kwon said Ye is ``creating works of art as if he is writing an autobiography,'' similar to people who post their diaries on blogs.
``To him, creation is expansion of thoughts and also a wound left behind by anguish. Continuous pursuit of beauty in anxious daily life that repeats everyday. Construction of one's own and unique world amongst ceaseless collisions with the world. These are the arts that he pursues and the lives that he has been leading. In conclusion, the art is life, life itself, to him,'' Kwon said.
For information, visit www.artside.org or call 725-1020.
British artist Keith Tyson is holding his first solo exhibition in Seoul at the Gana Art Gallery, Pyeongchang-dong. The exhibition, which runs through Dec. 2, features 20 works, including his nature paintings, studio wall drawings, sculptures and ``Geno Pheno'' paintings.
The 38-year old artist won the prestigious Turner Prize in 2002, and has been described as a ``mad professor of art'' for his obsession with science. Tyson was quoted saying: ``science is just the language by which we understand nature, and so it's the language I use.'' His ``Geno Pheno'' paintings are based on the idea of genotypes and phenotypes, which are concepts in genetics.
In the exhibition essay, David Teh said it is senseless to summarize Tyson's artistic style, or take note of all the historical, cultural and scientific references he uses.
``We take our cue from the work itself, from what it does and what. From time to time, it explicitly demands that we roll the dice and make another, subjectively determined, hypertextual, Choose-Your-Own-Adventure-style path through its superabundance of signage. We must enter into it as a variable plugged into an equation and inevitably thrown in a few variables of our own,'' Teh said.
For information how to get to Gana Art Gallery, visit www.ganaart.com.
An exhibition of Toeko Tatsuno's vibrantly colored works is on display at the Jean Art Gallery in Insa-dong. Tatsuno began doing oil paintings in the 1970s, but it was in the 1980's when she started her large colorful paintings with geometric forms.
``Shapes that frequently appear in the recent works of Tatsuno, ― some looking like bookshelves or boxes piled up, others comprising voluminous round forms ― inexorably create an impression of `presence' in our eyes, as though she painted actual objects,'' said Akira Tatehata, curator of National Museum of Art, Osaka.
Tatehata said the goal of the painting is not to depict an object, but to use the spaces in the canvass to create an illusion of an object. So, what seems like bookshelves are ``nothing but an illusion engendered through the logic of painting.''
``The world of this authentic painter makes us rediscover the richness and limitless possibility of the pictorial space,'' Tatehata said.
Tatsuno's exhibition runs through Dec. 16. For information, visit www.jeanart.net.