▲ Lee Gil Rae and the artwork ⓒ Savina Museum

An individual exhibition of artist Lee Gil Rae, known for his signature works based on pine trees, was held.

Following Lee's early works that live closely with nature and explore nature's temporality and historically using objects such as shells and earthenware fragments, he is now using copper pipes to present the artistic world. 

▲ Root, copper welding, 130x92x104cm, 2023 ⓒ Savina Museum

The artist creates works by cutting copper pipes to make circular rings and welding them to complete sculptures. This idea was inspired by the experience of seeing a truck full of copper pipes on a highway.

He explains that one side of the copper pipes on the truck had a regular circular shape and felt like a honeycomb or a cell unit. He greatly expanded the form of physical properties to express mainly vegetables and fruits such as garlic, pumpkins, and apples but began to express trees, natural sculptures, and even pine trees in 2012.

▲ Millennium-Pine Tree Lump, copper welding, 148x87x85cm, 2023 ⓒ Savina Museum

He explained, "Pine trees are familiar objects with our people as beings that are symbolized like our own trees and served as divine objects."

He was fascinated by the accumulated temporality revealed on the pine's epidermis, and he was attracted to the formative and aesthetic aspects of feeling the years through the pine tree trunk, bark, night frame, leaves, and roots.

▲ Pine Tree With Three Roots, copper welding, 250x193x150cm, 2015 ⓒ Savina Museum

The artist hopes that this exhibition will allow visitors to pay attention to the power of the invisible roots that support the tree. He also displays works based on stone and works that are painted in a unique way by coating ink in iron nails instead of brushes.

In this exhibition, Lee will present 106 works, including representative works, at the Savina Museum until April 21.

▲ The installation view of the exhibition ⓒ Savina Museum

Sayart / Nao Yim, yimnao@naver.com