Daegu Arts Center
has selected five emerging artists as the “2024 Young Artists of the Year.”
Now in its 27th edition, the annual “Young Artist of the Year” program
discovers emerging artists based in the Daegu-Gyeongbuk region, supporting
their creative activities and contributing to the creative development of the
regional art scene.
This year’s open
call drew applications from 57 young artists, from which the final five were
chosen after review: Gyuho Kim (sculpture/installation), Sora Park
(video/installation), GIAHN (Yoonki Ahn, video/installation), Miran Woo
(painting), and Wongi Lee (painting).
Gyuho
Kim finds beauty in the repetition of organic forms, whether regular or
irregular, and expresses the invisible temporality of form through
three-dimensional works using 3D modeling. In 2017, he won a special prize at
the MBC + Korea Figurative Sculpture Grand Exhibition.
Sora
Park focuses on social issues arising in an age of scientific and
technological development and digital media environments. In particular, she
visualizes speculative situations, figures, and products that could plausibly
emerge in the future based on science-fictional imagination. In 2021, she was
selected for the SOMA Museum of Art Drawing Center Archive and the Bloomberg
New Contemporaries in the UK.
GIAHN (Yoonki
Ahn) captures cultural phenomena and social structures observed in his
surroundings, expressing them through photography, installation, and
performance. He explores themes such as education, play, movement, and mobility
using diverse materials and media.
Miran
Woo focuses on subjective consciousness and perception in the process of
seeking the essence of existing beings. Working with wood as her primary
material, she paints fleeting and ever-changing moments, addressing the
fundamental existence of nature through intuitive and subjective impressions.
Wongi
Lee tells of confessional pain rooted in his personal emotions and
experiences through painting. Recently, he has been exploring drawing methods
that contrast dense images with variations of space, tone, density, and touch,
while employing purely formative images on canvas. In 2017, he was selected as
an emerging artist at Soosung Artpia.
The selected “Young
Artists of the Year” will receive support for exhibition preparation, including
production grants, catalog publication, exhibition space, and critic matching.
After about seven months of preparation, their exhibition will be held from
October 31 to December 14, 2024, across Exhibition Halls 1–5 at Daegu Arts
Center.