Equilibrium_Explosion 30 Apr. - 04 July 2015 _ Royal Gallery_ Seoul

Deviation and Explosion in Controlled and Balanced Space

Sooyeon Hong’s work process can be explained in three stages. First, she builds a background with layers of paints, dispensing with any visible spots or brush strokes. Number of layers creates a subtle neutral background color. Afterwards, she places abstract forms on her canvas, carefully considering force, balance and tension between the forms. Lastly, as she guides her flat form volumes and shadows through a slow constructive process that requires putting additional layers on the form, she is able to create an illusionary world in which abstract forms float around in an unknown, imaginary space. Her use of delicate bluish, greenish, and grayish colors gives viewers the sense of ambiguity. The seemingly simplistic pictures contain the ambiguous duality of delicate plastic beauty combined with splendid colors and aesthetics found in some minimalists’ paintings. This indescribable ambiguity is clearly the essence of her work.