Minjung Kim
Korean
Minjung Kim (b. 1962) is a contemporary Korean artist best known for her ink paintings by their transparency as well as her subtle formal compositions on layered paper. Committed to re-interpreting traditional Korean aesthetics, Kim employs a process-based organization of her thoughts, problems, and whims in each of her artworks. Through the repetitive work of burning and layering mulberry Hanji paper, she conveys the process of emotional healing and meditation. Often colorful and staccato, the artist describes her calligraphic work in emotional terms: “The movement, the colors, they are so calm and peaceful. They are my state of mind,” she says. Born in 1962 in Gwangju, Republic of Korea, Kim was encouraged by her family to pursue her artistic inclination from an early age, studying under various teachers including famed watercolorist Yeongyun Kang, and between the ages of thirteen and twenty-nine, Oriental calligraphy. This latter study allowed her to understand the fundamental precepts of Asiatic speculative tradition. As Jean-Christophe Ammann describes in his essay, “Oriental (figurative) thought differs markedly from that of the West. If Western art traditionally has always been subject to major changes and sudden breakthroughs, that of the East gives the priority to the constant. The constant bears within it changed perception and its forms of expression without continuity being lost.” (J. C. Ammann, The Light, The Shade, The Depth, 2015). The study of calligraphy did not just endow Minjung with this vision of the world but also taught her to communicate by means of the extremely controlled use of the brush, which “channels” the energy and directs it onto the paper. When in 1980 she enrolled in the Hongik University in Seoul, Minjung had already received a very thorough artistic education which was completed through the detailed study of Oriental painting. Once her university course had been completed in 1985, she took a Master’s degree at the same university with a thesis on the four basic materials in ink painting (mulberry Hanji paper, brush, ink pigment and the pigment grinding stone). Out of her curiosity about the Italian art which led Renaissance, she decided to move to Milan, Italy and later graduated from the Brera Academy of Fine Art in 1991. Here she studied less the basics of European painting, which she had already tackled at university in Korea, than the analysis of the works of Western artists who, during the 20th century, studied Oriental painting. In particular, certain works by Paul Klee and Franz Kline prompted her to approach a new aesthetic direction that took her progressively away from the figurative tradition of her country of origin towards an investigation of the expressive value of marks and maculas, two stylistic elements that combine perfectly with the “process-based view of the world” and the ability to “channel the energy”, both of which she learned in her study of calligraphy. “Unlike the concept in Korea, there is no distinction between Eastern and Western art. It is more of a matter of differences in materials.” The reason why Kim has chosen mulberry Hanji paper is that it is the best material which she could handle. She began with expressing the musical rhythm through ink, and later went beyond hand-drawing, committing herself to the natural lines created by candle light or incense burn. Her exploration of the interrelationship between Oriental and Western techniques and conceptions continues outside the Academy. She always executes her pictorial work on the floor, in keeping with Oriental tradition, because both literally and metaphorically the ground is the basic support for all painting. In her works, since 1998 on overlaid layers of paper, she burnt sections of them to generate an effect of three-dimensionality, to provide the viewer with a chronological dimension, and to indicate layers of time symbolized by the layers of paper. She gives quivering condition that is created by the burnt edges, and that reveals the form as they flourish, change, are overshadowed and then re-emerge from the background, immersed in those resounding spaces that embraces, contains and connects them all. This is the key to the great charm of Minjung Kim's work: a devotion to art that transcends itself in a profound contact with life, expression of an innate beauty and ungraspable amazement at incompleteness, at feeling oneself perennially among things. After graduating from school, Kim has lived and worked in Italy, presenting her works throughout the world including Italy, Switzerland, China, England, USA, and Israel for over thirty five years. Kim particularly has gained a remarkable attention at the exhibition ‘The Light, The Shade, The Depth’ held in Palazzo Caboto during the Venice Biennale in 2015. She has exhibited at prominent worldwide museums and galleries, such as Princeton University Art Museum, New Jersey, USA (2020); Langen Foundation, Neuss, Germany (2019); Gwangju Museum of Art, Gwangju, Korea (2018); Musée des Arts Asiatiques, Nice, France (2017); Hermès Foundation, Singapore (2017); OCI Museum of Art, Seoul, Korea (2015); Palazzo Caboto, Venice, Italy (2015); Oko, New York, USA (2014); Studio d'Arte Raffaelli, Trento, Italy (2014); MACRO (Museo d’Arte Contemporanea Roma), Rome, Italy (2012); the Henry Moore Institute, Leeds, UK (2008); Guanshanyue Art Museum, Shenzhen, China (2007); Fondazione Palazzo Bricherasio, Turin, Italy (2006); and Museo Comunale d’Arte Moderna Ascona, Ascona, Switzerland (2003). She participated in the Gwangju Biennale (2018, 2004). Her work is represented in numerous international public collections including the British Museum, London, UK; Leeum, Samsung Museum of Art, Seoul, Korea; Musée des Arts Asiatiques, Nice, France; Fundación Helga de Alvear, Cáceres, Sapin; Swiss Re Art Collection, Zürich, Switzerland; Herbert F. Johnson Museum of Art, Cornell University, New York, USA; Asia Society Museum, New York, USA; Fondazione Palazzo Bricherasio, Turin, Italy; the Museum Sbygningen, Copenhagen, Denmark; OCI Museum of Art, Seoul, Korea; and UniCredit Art Collection, Milan, Italy. She currently lives and works between France and the United States.
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Minjung Kim
Korean
Minjung Kim (b. 1962) is a contemporary Korean artist best known for her ink paintings by their transparency as well as her subtle formal compositions on layered paper. Committed to re-interpreting traditional Korean aesthetics, Kim employs a process-based organization of her thoughts, problems, and whims in each of her artworks. Through the repetitive work of burning and layering mulberry Hanji paper, she conveys the process of emotional healing and meditation. Often colorful and staccato, the artist describes her calligraphic work in emotional terms: “The movement, the colors, they are so calm and peaceful. They are my state of mind,” she says. Born in 1962 in Gwangju, Republic of Korea, Kim was encouraged by her family to pursue her artistic inclination from an early age, studying under various teachers including famed watercolorist Yeongyun Kang, and between the ages of thirteen and twenty-nine, Oriental calligraphy. This latter study allowed her to understand the fundamental precepts of Asiatic speculative tradition. As Jean-Christophe Ammann describes in his essay, “Oriental (figurative) thought differs markedly from that of the West. If Western art traditionally has always been subject to major changes and sudden breakthroughs, that of the East gives the priority to the constant. The constant bears within it changed perception and its forms of expression without continuity being lost.” (J. C. Ammann, The Light, The Shade, The Depth, 2015). The study of calligraphy did not just endow Minjung with this vision of the world but also taught her to communicate by means of the extremely controlled use of the brush, which “channels” the energy and directs it onto the paper. When in 1980 she enrolled in the Hongik University in Seoul, Minjung had already received a very thorough artistic education which was completed through the detailed study of Oriental painting. Once her university course had been completed in 1985, she took a Master’s degree at the same university with a thesis on the four basic materials in ink painting (mulberry Hanji paper, brush, ink pigment and the pigment grinding stone). Out of her curiosity about the Italian art which led Renaissance, she decided to move to Milan, Italy and later graduated from the Brera Academy of Fine Art in 1991. Here she studied less the basics of European painting, which she had already tackled at university in Korea, than the analysis of the works of Western artists who, during the 20th century, studied Oriental painting. In particular, certain works by Paul Klee and Franz Kline prompted her to approach a new aesthetic direction that took her progressively away from the figurative tradition of her country of origin towards an investigation of the expressive value of marks and maculas, two stylistic elements that combine perfectly with the “process-based view of the world” and the ability to “channel the energy”, both of which she learned in her study of calligraphy. “Unlike the concept in Korea, there is no distinction between Eastern and Western art. It is more of a matter of differences in materials.” The reason why Kim has chosen mulberry Hanji paper is that it is the best material which she could handle. She began with expressing the musical rhythm through ink, and later went beyond hand-drawing, committing herself to the natural lines created by candle light or incense burn. Her exploration of the interrelationship between Oriental and Western techniques and conceptions continues outside the Academy. She always executes her pictorial work on the floor, in keeping with Oriental tradition, because both literally and metaphorically the ground is the basic support for all painting. In her works, since 1998 on overlaid layers of paper, she burnt sections of them to generate an effect of three-dimensionality, to provide the viewer with a chronological dimension, and to indicate layers of time symbolized by the layers of paper. She gives quivering condition that is created by the burnt edges, and that reveals the form as they flourish, change, are overshadowed and then re-emerge from the background, immersed in those resounding spaces that embraces, contains and connects them all. This is the key to the great charm of Minjung Kim's work: a devotion to art that transcends itself in a profound contact with life, expression of an innate beauty and ungraspable amazement at incompleteness, at feeling oneself perennially among things. After graduating from school, Kim has lived and worked in Italy, presenting her works throughout the world including Italy, Switzerland, China, England, USA, and Israel for over thirty five years. Kim particularly has gained a remarkable attention at the exhibition ‘The Light, The Shade, The Depth’ held in Palazzo Caboto during the Venice Biennale in 2015. She has exhibited at prominent worldwide museums and galleries, such as Princeton University Art Museum, New Jersey, USA (2020); Langen Foundation, Neuss, Germany (2019); Gwangju Museum of Art, Gwangju, Korea (2018); Musée des Arts Asiatiques, Nice, France (2017); Hermès Foundation, Singapore (2017); OCI Museum of Art, Seoul, Korea (2015); Palazzo Caboto, Venice, Italy (2015); Oko, New York, USA (2014); Studio d'Arte Raffaelli, Trento, Italy (2014); MACRO (Museo d’Arte Contemporanea Roma), Rome, Italy (2012); the Henry Moore Institute, Leeds, UK (2008); Guanshanyue Art Museum, Shenzhen, China (2007); Fondazione Palazzo Bricherasio, Turin, Italy (2006); and Museo Comunale d’Arte Moderna Ascona, Ascona, Switzerland (2003). She participated in the Gwangju Biennale (2018, 2004). Her work is represented in numerous international public collections including the British Museum, London, UK; Leeum, Samsung Museum of Art, Seoul, Korea; Musée des Arts Asiatiques, Nice, France; Fundación Helga de Alvear, Cáceres, Sapin; Swiss Re Art Collection, Zürich, Switzerland; Herbert F. Johnson Museum of Art, Cornell University, New York, USA; Asia Society Museum, New York, USA; Fondazione Palazzo Bricherasio, Turin, Italy; the Museum Sbygningen, Copenhagen, Denmark; OCI Museum of Art, Seoul, Korea; and UniCredit Art Collection, Milan, Italy. She currently lives and works between France and the United States.
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Sign up for a FREE account today!
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Digitizing your art collection allows you to access it anywhere around the world.
A computer, tablet, and phone showing the native ArtCollection.io applications.

Available on any device, mac, pc & more

ArtCollection.io is a cloud based solution that gives you access to your collection anywhere you have a secure internet connection. In addition to a beautiful web dashboard, we also provide users with a suite of mobile applications that allow for data synchronization and offline browsing. Feel confident in your ability to access your art collection anywhere around the world at anytime. Download ArtCollection.io today!

App Store button to download iOS application.
Google Play Button to download Android application.