Minjung Kim

Minjung Kim’s process-based works form a meditative exploration of repetition and materiality. The artist often employs ink applied to sheets of mulberry Hanji paper, which are then layered over one another and frequently burned by the artist. While this process is informed by traditional Korean art practices (in which she was educated and which forms the basis of her art), Kim also draws from European art history, particularly the work of abstract artists such as Paul Klee (1879-1940) and Franz Kline (1910-1962), an engagement that led to new explorations with colour. To Kim, the paper is analogous to her own skin, as she puts it: both in black ink and with colour, the artist seeks a vitality in her works, to represent her ‘state of mind’.

Born in 1962, Gwangju, Republic of Korea, Kim studied at Hongik University, Seoul obtaining an MFA in Oriental Painting. On completion of her studies, the artist relocated to Italy to pursue an interest in European art history. In 1991, she completed a second MFA at the Brera Academy of Fine Art, Milan. Her first solo exhibition was in 1985 at the Modern Korean Visual Art, Seoul Art Center. Since then, Kim’s work has been exhibited globally, at locations that include the Cappella di Villa Ruffolo, Ravello (1997), Copenhagen Gallery, Copenhagen (2002), and the Fondazione Palazzo Bricherasio, Turin (2006). Other solo exhibitions by the artist include Traces, OCI Museum of Art, Seoul (2015), Oneness, Hermès Foundation, Singapore (2017), and Making the Void, Filling the Void, Gwangju Museum of Art, Gwangju (2018). Among her group exhibitions are numbered Paris, New York, Washington D.C. The Odyssey 2001, Korean Republic Embassy, Washington D.C. (2001), Prospects and Interiors: Sculptors’ Drawings of Inner Space, Henry Moore Institute, Leeds (2008), Clouds Stretching For A Thousand Miles: Ink in Asian Art, Asia Society, New York (2018), and Pushing Paper: Contemporary Drawing from 1970 to Now, The British Museum, London (2018). Her work is also held in several international collections: Tate Modern, London, UK, Samsung Museum of Art, Seoul, Phasing, Asia Society, New York, The British Museum, London, and The Metropolitan Museum, New York. Kim lives and works between France and the United States.