Juyeon KIM's Solo Exhibition_curated by Byoung Heon KIM
Space for the artist to reprocess reductive ideas about nature or scenery ? a structure made of 20,000 newspapers turned green by seedlings, a bookshelf filled with books covered with seedlings, earth planted with trees, a three-ton salt mass to be touched by the human body, huge pieces of clothing on which seeds are to be cultivated, and a sofa covered with cotton bursting forth with seedlings ? is neither separate nor non-material. Covered and hidden by formal, uniform, idealized, and familiar space, this space is unfamiliar and uncomfortable. It is private, multiple and not refined. This is a space bearing empirical and specific knowledge and responsibilities in place of spaces that are gradually deviating from the boundary of knowledge and responsibilities. In other words, her installation works are likely to use a domain of our body, nature, labor, and materials, that is, a space which enables us to contact with physical conditions that support our life and make our life sustainable, perceptually as a meeting place for us to stay only for a while, rather than using the domain or the space exclusively as a form of 'habitation.' Of course, we can relate the concept of space to other structures, but Kim Juyeon's installation work always reminds us of the fact that a space to be embodied materially in our lives is ultimately a part and true being of the planet earth.
