Sayart.net
Claire Seo, ssjjyy516@gmail.com

Kiaf PLUS ended yesterday, 5 Sep. The KUZO Gallery was the contemporary art gallery that incorporated the most Korean elements among the many galleries participating. Gallery KUZO, which was located near the entrance of A Hall, attracted people’s attention. In particular, Artist Seahyun Lee’s painting made visitors stop in order to appreciate.

Gallery KUZO aims to derive meaningful aesthetic action by juxtaposing different media. The gallery also has sought to be the place of circulation as a link between the new art and the Korea traditional art since 2012 when the gallery started.
 

▲ Seahyun Lee, Beyond Red, Oil on linen, 2020, Courtesy of KUZO Gallery

Artist Seahyun Lee who is famous as ‘A red landscape painter’ combines the hyper-realism of the West with the conceptual landscape paintings of the East. His artwork looks like a landscape painting, but closely, there are images of various stories.

Inside the booth, artworks by Sungwook Park, Casper Kang, Byunghun Min and Hyangro Yoon were also exhibited.

▲ Sungwook Park, 놓여진 편片, 2022, Ceramic, 120 × 112 cm, Courtesy of KUZO Gallery

Sungwook Park added his own modern and creative process to Bunchung which is a form of traditional Korean stoneware. The process is that he makes Pyeon (shard), bakes it over the fire. And then he dips it in white clay water and takes it out. “My work is a process that is finding the essence in conflict and harmony between different substances such as water, soil, fire and wood,” said Sungwook Park.

 

▲ Casper Kang, Star 169, 2022, Burnt hanji & polygonum indigo dyed ottchil hanji by 장지방 on linen hemp,135 × 135 cm, Courtesy of KUZO Gallery 

You could see another unique artwork. That was Casper Kang’s work. Casper Kang is a second generation Korean-Canadian. He dismantles and recombines its properties of traditional Korean paper 'Hanji' by burning, tanning, crushing, bleaching, tearing, and sagging. Above all things, burning is the work of engraving the boundary between the control and coincidence on the canvas. He says this method is connecting topics related to human history.

▲ Byunghun Min, Weed (WV037), 1996 -2014, Gelatin silver print, 115 × 100 cm, Courtesy of KUZO Gallery 

Photographs of Byunghun Min who represents Korean photographic media were also exhibited. He has continued only black-and-white, straight photography for 40 years. The lyricism of his black-and-white photography makes people experience, aesthetics beyond the characteristics of the photograph. Byunghun Min’s works have been collected by highly noted museums and galleries around the globe: San Francisco Museum of Modern Art, National Museum of Modern and Contemporary Art, Los Angeles County Museum of Art, etc.

▲ Hyangro Yoon, Drive to the Galaxy, 2022, Epson UltraChrome inkjet, acrylic, oil, on canvas, 182 × 102 cm, Courtesy of KUZO Gallery 

Hyangro Yoon introduces herself as an ‘image collector’. She has established her work style like painting, installation, sculpture and animation which is based on contemporary imaging technology.

“Gallery KUZO could show new and representative artworks of artists who represent each generation in the Korean art field during the Kiaf PLUS. We will try to show you with better exhibitions in the future,” said Yu Jin I, representative of Gallery KUZO.

Gallery KUZO is currently located in Seongsu-dong in Korea, and artist Seahyun Lee's exhibition is open until 30 Oct 2022.