“Heryun Kim: 1992 – 2011”
 
Art at the Asan Institute for Policy Studies (AAIPS) is pleased to announce “Heryun Kim: 1992 – 2011”, an exhibition of nine paintings and three works on paper. This is the first comprehensive exhibition of Heryun Kim’s works from the past 20 years. Many works in the exhibition have never been presented publically in Korea. 
 
–      Exhibition dates: November 11, 2011 – January 21, 2012
–      Location : AAIPS (Art at the Asan Institute for Policy Studies)
                        The Asan Institute for Policy Studies, Floor 1
                        1-176 Shinmunro 2-Ga, Jongno-Gu, Seoul
–      Hours : Open daily from 10:30am-6:30pm
–      Contact : Jayoon Choi +82 (0)2.3701.7323 / e-mail art@asaninst.org
 
The artist’s continuous exploration of Korean ink and oil paint has allowed her to develop a signature artistic style. The textured application of oil and ink are at times untamed; other times they are careful and fragile. Her color palette ranges from the elegant to the extravagant. Kim paints in the traditional form of portraiture, still-lives and landscape. Yet her work barely contains the tension between the subject’s objectivity and artist’s own emotion. This exhibition reveals the range of influences she has absorbed as an artist, academic, wife, mother and woman, and the products of her heightened colors and calligraphic gestures reveal the highly autobiographical nature of her work.
 
The ‘black-ground’ paintings from the “Moon Garden” series were inspired by the palettes and subjects of European old masters whose works the artist experienced first-hand while studying in Germany. The stiff orange lines in Princess Margaretta 1 are an homage to the full swollen skirt worn by the young Princess in Velazquez’ Las Meninas. The thick textured brushstrokes of black paint in these works, which at times purposely overwhelm the subject, reflect the influence of Caravaggio’s dramatic use of chiaroscuro*.
 
Works such as Birth Album, painted with Korean ink and watercolor, were based upon photographs of Kim’s own children from her family album. Memory Scroll 1992-2011, a collection of the artist’s favorite sketches, becomes an intimate invitation of Kim’s own artistic journey.
 
A series of six luscious paintings of the politically charged Im Jin River—near the artist’s home and studio—recall the late works of the Abstract Expressionists, Willem de Kooning and Richard Diebenkorn.
 
Heryun Kim (b. 1964) lives and works in Paju, Korea. Her works have been the subject of numerous exhibitions including those at Soma Drawing Center, Kunsthalledresden, and Stadtmuseum Berlin Ephraim-Palais. Her works have also been presented in exhibitions at the National Museum of Contemporary Art-Korea, Ilmin Museum of Art, Kulturforum Villa Oppenehim in Berlin, and Espace Louis Vuitton Paris.
 
AAIPS would like to extend a special thanks to those who lent their works to this exhibition.
The next exhibition at AAIPS will be a site-specific installation by Jinnie Seo, opening in February 2012.
 
*Chiaroscuro in art is characterized by strong contrasts between light and dark, usually bold contrasts affecting a whole composition.