Kwak Intan (b. 1986) reconstructs remnants of the past to document and express them as sculptures in the present. Drawing inspiration from the paintings and sculptures of great masters in art history, he transforms lingering afterimages from his mind into entirely new sculptural creations of his own.

In his early works, Kwak Intan presented figurative sculptures that seemed to externalize painful obsessions and anxiety. For instance, in his first solo exhibition 《The Realm of Three (3의 영역)》, his works ranged from busts with grimacing expressions, to human figures standing with their heads bowed and faces buried in chains, to small sculptures where parts of the body were obsessively overlapped—each conveying psychological states through the language of sculpture.

Meanwhile, since 2019, Kwak Intan’s work has shown a shift away from the compulsive representation of figurative bodies toward a tendency toward abstraction. From this point on, he began referencing historical works described in art history as a way of gathering fragments drifting through his mind and reconstructing them into sculptural forms.
 
Kwak drew inspiration from the sculptures of Vladimir Tatlin and Auguste Rodin, as well as the paintings of Ha Chong-Hyun and Lee Ungno, reinterpreting them into sculptures with his own forms, structures, and textures. However, these historical references are intertwined with the artist’s obsessions—that is, his confrontation with the inner self—resulting in works that appear jumbled together, without adherence to any fixed principle or style.

In his 2019 solo exhibition 《Unique Form》, where this tendency first became apparent, Kwak dismantled and reconstructed earlier busts that had expressed the psychology of obsession and freedom, layering them together with new sculptures appropriated from the past. Art critic Choi Tae-man observed that by appropriating historical references and then re-appropriating his own past, Kwak created “a sculptural time-space in which history and the self cannot be clearly distinguished.”

Within this hybridized time-space, the artist’s own history becomes entangled with both Eastern and Western art histories. Furthermore, his work dissolves and intermingles the boundaries between painting and sculpture—traditional media with distinct hierarchies and histories—repositioning them as new sculptural forms. The flowing materiality of ink overlaps with the traces of welded steel fragments, merging ink painting and sculpture, while resin and acrylic paint cling to structural frameworks, bringing painting and sculpture together in a single place.

Moreover, fragments of discarded materials from the production process often mingle with the finished sculptures, blurring even the boundary between the artwork (the sculpture as a result) and the pedestal (the base that supports the sculpture and directs the viewer’s gaze). In his practice, the pedestal and the sculpture are never fixed in their positions. A sculpture once presented as an autonomous work may, on another occasion, stand in the place of a pedestal.

In his 2020 solo exhibition 《Sculpture Gate》 at Space 9, the works similarly revealed how various art historical references became entangled with the artist’s own compulsions about sculpture, appearing sutured together within the bodies of new sculptural forms.
 
For example, in the cubic sculpture The Out of Control of Compulsion (2020), Kwak experimented with recording and expressing past paintings on each surface of the structure. This experiment, he notes, was influenced by Auguste Rodin’s The Gates of Hell, in which individual sculptures coalesce into an architectural scene. Just as Rodin’s work transforms gathered figures into an architectural landscape, Kwak’s cement cube consolidates fragments of past paintings into a newly formed sculptural landscape.

Beginning with his 2021 works, Kwak Intan turned his attention to the movement within sculpture. He became interested in the latent motion embedded in the myriad forms that compose the surfaces of great masters’ works as well as his own earlier sculptures. His aim was to translate the writhing visual energy of these otherwise static surfaces into new sculptural forms.
 
For instance, Movement 21-1 (2021) originated from the imagined act of liberating the figure from The Out of Control of Compulsion (2020) and Person Sitting on the Gate of Hell (2020), sending it swiftly elsewhere. While this work also references multiple sources, Kwak approached it with greater freedom, immersing himself in tactile textures and the processes of both dismantling and reconstructing form.

Moreover, Movement 21-1 was presented alongside Kwak’s earlier works that referenced various art pieces in the group exhibition 《Injury Time》 at Museumhead in 2021. In this context, the work reflects not the external adoption of references, but an inner inevitability that permeates his practice. As a result, his sculptures move beyond the mere assemblage of remnants from the past, emerging instead as forms that yearn for new collisions and trajectories of movement.

Meanwhile, beginning in 2022, Kwak Intan’s ‘Child Sculptor’ series follows his characteristic method of sequentially developing works by referencing art historical imagery, contemporary visual culture, and his own earlier pieces, while also expressing his desire to return to the beginner’s mind of childhood, seeking freedom from established frameworks and the constraints of reality.
 
In these works, Kwak recalls the childhood sensation of playing with clay and immersing himself in the sheer joy of making. As if transported back to that time, he treats the sculptural body itself as a playground, unfolding his visual language with spontaneity and freedom.

The 2022 work of ‘Child Sculptor,’ presented in the group exhibition 《Sculptural Impulse》 at the Seoul Museum of Art in 2022, playfully re-references the artist’s previous works. The lower body of this 3.7-meter-tall piece uses the leg forms from When Legs Become Stairs, recast in resin clay in a variety of colors as the main structural element, upon which the artist unfolds the shapes and textures explored in earlier experiments.
 
In contrast, the upper body, which underwent a different spatial and temporal process, was created by scanning a portion of a small model that served as the starting point for the 2021 ‘Movement’ series and enlarging it through 3D printing.

Meanwhile, the work presented in Sculpture City, Seoul in 2024 combines multiple hand-formed emoticons and small figures atop the sculpted full body in an improvisational yet intuitive manner, creating a playful space where a variety of expressions and sensations intermingle.
 
Like the images or information we encounter through multiple channels in daily life, ‘Child Sculptor’—with its vivid mix of colors and forms—evokes a tactile sense of liveliness. It is also a reflection of the artist’s momentary emotions and sensations, embodied in the very process of its creation.

In the 2022 solo exhibition 《Palette》 at K.O.N.G GALLERY, Kwak Intan presented the experimental ‘Palette’ series, in which sculptures themselves serve as palettes. In this work, the artist shapes everyday concerns filling the mind into clay by hand, attaching them to an underlying structure to create varied, tactile contours. Following the flow of this tactility, small additional sculptural elements are added and paint is layered on, ultimately producing a new form that blends painting and sculpture.

The resulting Palette 2 (2022) evokes the blue stars that appear in Kim Whanki’s paintings. Looking more closely at other works in the series, one can see Rodin’s busts and various emoticons—each reimagined as small sculptural elements—that decorate the pieces and add a playful dimension to the works.
 
Through this series of experimental works—using sculpture itself as a palette for coloring—Kwak Intan reached a new turning point, advancing beyond the sculptural approaches he had previously explored. In subsequent works, he moved toward experimenting with sculpture as a form that can endlessly expand, traversing between the real and the virtual in a process of continual variation.

For example, in Intersection of Sculptures 1 (조각 교차로 1) (2023), Kwak Intan uses an unfinished bust as a pedestal while simultaneously transforming the large openings in the bust’s facial area into passages and doorways through which various sculptures intersect.
 
The organic lines that pass through the bust reference a road intersection. The sculptures above the intersection combine hand-shaped elements with pieces that were 3D-scanned and printed. Through this process, the work becomes a space where sculpture, both real and virtual, and forms from different spatial and temporal contexts intersect, generating a sense of organic vitality.

Kwak Intan describes sculpture as “space, or a landscape.” Through the medium of sculpture, he mixes and reconstructs various times and landscapes from his mind, creating a third, new landscape. He treats this creative process as a playful arena, infusing his works with the pure playfulness of art.
 
Kwak Intan’s practice redefines the meaning of sculpture through the ways he records time and landscapes, his organic and experimental forms, and his sculptural approach that embodies emotion and symbolism. Recently, he has expanded his focus to audience interaction, demonstrating that sculpture need not be a fixed form but can function as a space that mediates experience and sensation, a dynamic presence.

 “Sculpture is a passage through which countless thoughts travel, and a playful space where diverse forms converge.”  (Kwak Intan, Artist’s Note)

Kwak Intan has a BFA in Environmental Sculpture from the University of Seoul and an MFA in Sculpture from Hongik University. His recent solo exhibitions include 《Shape and Shape》 (Ulsan Art Museum, Ulsan, 2025), 《Palette》 (K.O.N.G GALLERY, Seoul, 2022), 《Sculpture Gate》 (space 9, Seoul, 2020), 《Unique Form》 (studio 148, Seoul, 2019), among others.
 
He has also participated in numerous group exhibitions, including the 7th Changwon Sculpture Biennale 《silent apple》 (Changwon, 2024), 《Circus Effect》 (Nakwon Sangga, d/p, Seoul, 2024), 《Shine That Eternal Silence Upon Us》 (GCS, Seoul, 2023), 《Sculptural Impulse》 (Seoul Museum of Art, Seoul, 2022), 《Injury Time 1》 (WESS, Seoul, 2022), 《Injury Time》 (Museumhead, Seoul, 2021), and 《Against》 (Kimsechoong Museum, Seoul, 2021).
 
Kwak Intan was selected as a ‘Public Art New Hero’ in 2021.

References

• 곽인탄, 인스타그램 (Kwak Intan, Instagram)
• 공근혜갤러리, 곽인탄 (K.O.N.G GALLERY, Kwak Intan)
• 비애티튜드, 놀이하는 창작, 유희하는 조각
• 퍼블릭아트, 터지고 비어져 나오는 뒤죽박죽의 자유
• 뮤지엄헤드, [서문] 인저리 타임 (Museumhead, [Preface] Injury Time)
• 서울시립미술관, [작품 설명글] 조각충동 (Seoul Museum of Art, [Artwork Description] Sculptural Impulse)
• 조각도시서울, [작품 설명글] 곽인탄 – 어린이 조각가 (Sculpture City, Seoul, [Artwork Description] Kwak Intan – Child Sculptor)
• 공근혜갤러리, [서문] 팔레트 (K.O.N.G GALLERY, [Preface] Palette)
• 울산시립미술관, [전시 소개] 모양과 모양 (Ulsan Art Museum, [Exhibition Overview] Shape and Shape)