Artist
Jeongyeon Kim
Jeongyeon Kim (ê¹€ì •ì—°) is an artist, explores family relationships and domestic spaces through sculpture, moving images, and installations. Drawing from the archetype of the heteronormative nuclear family in East Asian households and personal autobiographical experiences, her work investigates intimacy, privacy, and the emotional layers embedded in our living environments.
Q1. What inspires the artist?
Jeongyoen is inspired by exploring physical traces, blank spaces, family relationships, nostalgia, female rage, and archives. She focuses on phenomena or objects that have endured through time and history, intrigued by how they are displayed, whether in organised settings like museums or archives, or informal contexts like billboards or worn-out streets.
Q2. What does being a female artist mean?
Jeongyeon is conscious of the many trailblazers who have paved the way for self-expression. It is important for her to strive for originality and avoid simply repeating what has already been told and created.
Q3. How does Korean culture influence artist's art?
Jeongyeon Kim shares that most of her personal experiences stem from Korean society and the Korean household where she grew up. Her works focus on home and family. They convey a universal quality, yet they distinctly reflect the typical social trends of Korean society. They address themes such as gender inequality within the household, traditional rituals, patriarchy, and more.
Q4. Who are the female artist role models, and why?
Jeongyeon looks up to Louise Bourgeois. Whenever she feels skeptical about her work, she always returns to Bourgeois' drawings. Jeongyeon Kim admires Bourgeois' ability to transform the personal into the creative and strives to emulate that strength in her own work.
Q5. What projects are currently being worked on?
Jeongyeon is currently working on a project for her degree show, where she is creating an atmospheric work using traditional Korean paper. The fibrous paper wrinkles easily when pasted on the wall, a characteristic she uses to visualise empty space. She continues to explore and create works focused on domestic environments.
The Lock, 2024
Plaster 10 x 15 cm
This plaster casting reenacting the scene of locking the door reflects Jeongyeon’s childhood memories. It also implies the concept of setting boundaries.
Family Tree, 2024
3D scupture with MDF
Top part 57.7 × 58 cm
Tray 34.8 × 59.8 cm
'Family Tree' may look similar to the 'Connect 4 game', consisting of 20 green discs with male hand cutouts and 20 purple discs with silhouette images of figures. Each time a disc is inserted in a slot, it generates a random image. The two-sideness of this interactive artwork represents the co-exitence of building and obstructing. Through her participatory work, Jeongyeon demonstrates the randomness of the process of forming a family.