[Exhibition of the Week] Icheon Municipal Woljeon Museum of Art 'Yokai Baekgwado' Exhibition · Cha Minyoung Solo Exhibition 'Shake Up' and More

▲Minyoung Cha Solo Exhibition 'Shake Up' = Gallery X2 presents the solo exhibition 'Shake Up' by artist Minyoung Cha. The exhibition showcases the works of installation artist Minyoung Cha, who captures panoramas of life and the world within a travel bag, based on meticulous and detailed expressive abilities. Notably, this exhibition allows visitors to enter the artist's work themselves.

Suitcase Chain_2022_mixed media_100x280x330cm ⓒJEAN DESIGNART. [Photo by Gallery X2]

This is realized through a giant bag sculpture installed in the center of the gallery, where visitors can enter the bag and observe the outside through lenses installed inside the sculpture, directly experiencing becoming the subject inside the bag, which was previously only viewed from outside.

By expanding the work, which was previously limited to observing the inside of the bag, to the entire gallery and including the viewer as part of the artwork, the viewer undergoes a psychological process of identifying the gaze of the other as their own by entering the artwork directly.

Inter Object_2022_mixed media_113x117x42.5cm ⓒJEAN DESIGNART
Photo by Gallery X2

This variation of perspective acts as an act of overcoming the existing limitations of the work, elevating the appreciation proposed by the artist and providing the audience with an opportunity for autonomous reflection. The exhibition runs until September 15, at Gallery X2, Hakdong-ro, Gangnam-gu, Seoul.

Dojinwook, Cheongsaek Chusang (Blue Abstraction), 2021, Oil on canvas, 130.3x162.2cm Photo by Lina Gallery

▲Jinwook Do & Seil Jang 'Form (形像)' = Lina Gallery hosts the exhibition 'Form (形像)' by artists Jinwook Do and Seil Jang. Both artists start from 'nature' as their point of departure and aim to communicate with the audience based on this. For them, 'nature' is both an object of contemplation and a trigger for various emotions. This exhibition presents the forms of the two artists, which began with the keyword 'nature' in everyday life.

Jinwook Do expresses fragmentary appearances of natural objects seen in daily life with hyperrealistic detail. The artist states that in perceiving 'any object,' we have the actual appearance, memories, and fantasies about the object. Furthermore, these can feel like a scene on a canvas and are perceived in various forms. In other words, the artist hopes that the 'visual objects' he creates will evoke the image not of reality but of what each individual sees or desires. Through hyperrealistic images, the artist also aims to stimulate senses beyond vision.

Jang Se-il, Standard Animal_Dachshund, 2022, Stainless Steel, Car Paint, Clear Finished, 128x40x70cm [Photo by Lina Gallery]

Seil Jang simplifies animal forms while emphasizing their characteristics. The artist feels wonder and awe at the fact that a living being undergoes ecological mutation as a process of adapting to its environment. He believes that we can find similarities between our own stages of adapting to the surrounding environment and the animals' forms that mutate to adapt to nature. In other words, the artist seeks to sculpturally express the form of animals tamed within a structured society. The exhibition runs until September 2, at Lina Gallery, Nonhyeon-ro, Gangnam-gu, Seoul.

Seoyongseon_Ban Go, Seowangmo, 72.5×90.7cm, Acrylic on canvas, 2003, 2005
Photo provided by Icheon Municipal Woljeon Museum of Art

▲'Encyclopedia of Yokai' Exhibition = Icheon City Woljeon Museum of Art presents the 'Encyclopedia of Yokai' exhibition. This exhibition features over 30 works by six artists, depicting yokai (妖怪) appearing in various forms through folklore.

The Encyclopedia of Yokai includes not only the mysterious and strange yokai from the 'Classic of Mountains and Seas (Sanhaegyeong)' but also newly created yokai imagined by six contemporary artists. Through this, the exhibition explores the coexistence of humans and yokai, the boundaries between them, and the stories of darkness and hope they convey. If yokai were born from human fears, then through yokai we can glimpse what those fears are and, furthermore, understand humans through their attempts to confront those fears. Therefore, as long as fear remains in the human heart, yokai will continue to exist.

Donghyun Son_Pine the Great, 194×130cm, Ink and color on paper, 2014 [Photo courtesy of Icheon City Woljeon Museum of Art]

The yokai presented in the exhibition are no longer objects of fear. They are beings reflecting human desires and imagination, mechanisms to overcome dark situations, and companions on the journey to find the true self. The six artists present yokai paintings that are 'so bizarre and unexpected that they surprise people at first sight.'

Through yokai, they discuss human desires, experiences of unity with nature, escapism from reality, and appear as muses for artists, each breathing life into yokai in their own way. The exhibition offers a way to read human inner worlds while unfolding the limitless transformations of yokai. The exhibition runs until October 1, at Icheon City Woljeon Museum of Art, Gyeongchung-daero, Icheon City.

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