Kim Yunshin: Towards Oneness is a solo exhibition by Kim Yunshin, one of the first-generation female sculptors in Korea, born in 1935 and still actively engaged in her art practice. This exhibition portrays Kim’s free-spirited artistic journey through over 70 works by the artist, including her sculptures in wood, stone, as well as lithographic works. Kim is relatively less known in Korea because she worked mainly in Argentina since moving there in 1983. However, her artless sense of form fully brings the natural attributes of material to life, and demonstrates both a sense of uniqueness as well as universality which transcend time and place. Based on her philosophical thoughts on nature and universe, Kim’s sculptures in traditional form produced through laborious physical actions of the artist question the meaning of the actual sensations of the material which become numb in the digital age. Kim is still weaving the Korean sculpture history today as the very history herself, breathing together with the contemporary age.
Born in 1935 in Wonsan, Gangwon province (North Korea), Kim experienced the tumultuous history of the Korean peninsula in the 20th century at an early age, including the liberation of Korea and the Korean War. This ironically eliminated her fears in making new challenges. Kim graduated from the Department of Sculpture in Hongik University and left to study in the School of Sculpture at Ecole nationale superieure des Beaux-Arts in Paris, France. In the art capital of the world at the time, Kim immersed herself in the latest art trends and developed her sculptural sensibilities through diverse experiments. Kim returned to Korea in 1969, and for ten or so years before moving to Argentina, she led the Korea Sculptress Association as one of the first-generation female sculptors of Korea. Kim demonstrated her successful practice as an artist in the Korean sculpture world, participating in exhibitions like the 12th Sao Paulo Biennale in 1973. In the midst of such prosperous artistic career, Kim decided to move to Argentina in 1984, purely out of her desires to explore new materials as an artist and expand her practice. The hard wood she came across in Argentina allowed the artist to express the architectural structure and the dense sense of force in her work. Kim continued to explore the new material while living in Mexico from 1988 to 1991, and in Brazil from 2001 to 2002. Kim’s artistic journey is still ongoing in 2023, at the artist’s age of 88.
Add Two Add One, Divide Two Divide One is a title the artist has been applying to her works since the late 1970s. The words “add” and “divide” originate from Eastern philosophy of Yin and Yang, and are fundamental ideas that explain the creation of the world and universe. Darkness and light cannot exist separately on their own and exist in correspondence with each other. Complementing seasons unfold in the world simultaneously, as it is summer in Korea when it’s winter in Argentina. The same goes for the bark and the inner wood of trees, an important element in wood sculpture. As such, yin and yang are two yet one, and one yet two. Kim realized that all matters in the universe are an infinite repetition of the interaction between “yin” (fragmentation and division) and “yang” (convergence and integration). In other words, two heterogeneous elements meet (“add two”) and become one through interaction (“add one”), and this sum is divided into two again (“divide two”) to each become one (“divide one”). Kim also explained that her sculptural process involves adding her soul to wood (add), dividing space in wood (divide), and becoming a perfect whole (artwork). This exhibition focuses on the philosophy of the artist’s representative work Add Two Add One, Divide Two Divide One, and presents her oeuvre in 4 sections which focus on different forms of art: Lithography, Stone sculpture, Wood sculpture, and Kim’s recent works produced in Korea.
The human physical contact with each other was inevitably reduced to the minimum for the past three years due to external factors. As most activities were replaced with online ones, however, the thirst for actual physical contact and real sensations ironically increased. This is why Kim’s work, which utilizes nature as its material, is so captivating. The sensation of primitive nature in Kim’s work embraces the audience with a sense of stability and significance that contrasts with the virtual lightness that’s easily volatilized. Kim’s works offer the viewers the opportunity to restore their fundamental sensations that have become numb, to feel themselves as a part of nature and the universe, and bond with them. Furthermore, this exhibition will further the interest and research on Kim, who has always lived as one with art and hopefully revive the history of female sculptors in Korea.
Viewing point
1. View the sculptures from various perspectives, and feel how their forms change.
2. Try to find common visual characteristics in the works, made in different mediums and from different periods.
3. Examine how the artist’s work changed in form when she came into contact with a new material (such as the tree from Argentina that is harder and wider than trees from Korea).
4. Through various archive materials like photographs and exhibition brochures, explore the activities and environment of the art world around the artist.
5. Carefully examine how the single material of the tree can be created into a diverse range of works with different forms and impressions.
