"Walked down the water, I thought of my Homeland"

Various combinations of A3 DIN each, linocut print on mulberry paper (Hanji), 2024

"I Walked Along the Water Thinking of My Homeland" comprises seven wall pieces under the same name, each with a number count from Hah nah (one in Korean) to Eel gob (Seven in Korean). 

Each piece ranges from 2 to 16 individual modular units forming a larger whole. The prints are created using the technique of linocut on Korean mulberry paper, with each unit about the size of the international paper size A3 DIN (297 x 420 mm). Then the pieces are assembled on the exhibition site. 

My art springs forth from my life events and poignant emotional experiences. Yes, they are fleeting and ephemeral, but I believe it’s these lived and felt moments that need to be given attention to and allowed to be transformed to an art piece so that they can be shared with other people.

Thus my art making is an effort to identify and make connections between my personal experiences and the socio-political landscape. By reading what other people have written about similar experiences, and coming to realize that my story belongs to a shared experience, I am able to formulate my perspectives on various contemporary phenomena.

For this series of works, I immersed myself in reading the varied stories of people who have left their home to different places. Whether they are students, refugees, workers, regardless of their legal status, I find in their stories both fragility and resilience. These stories are like ointment to the restless mind pestered by unrelenting questions directed at the self: Where is my homeland?

"I Walked Along the Water Thinking of My Homeland" employs a lattice like pattern made from a Korean word for home, 집. This letter is repeated all over the page over the colored dots that are systematically arranged.