DOOSAN Gallery Seoul presents 《Where Is My Voice》, a solo exhibition of
works by artist Jeongsu Woo, from Wednesday, November 18 through Wednesday,
December 23, 2020. Once a participating artist at the exhibition 《DOOSAN Art Lab 2017》, Woo was selected to
join DOOSAN Residency New York to live and work in New York. This exhibition
unfolds around a large-scale painting, Where the Voice Is (2020),
to introduce a series of wallpaper and fabric installations highlighting the
artist’s versatile modes.
Ten meters by two meters in dimension, Where the
Voice Is is one of Woo’s most recent works and the centerpiece
of this exhibition, large enough to take up an entire wall of the gallery
space. Though considered one piece, this work comprises 16 large and small
canvases. Woo lays out over the fragmented surfaces the Greek myths of Echo and
Siren, both stories associated with the theme “voice,” adding elements of
design and patterns to his painterly motif. The two myths—one about Echo, who
was cursed into repeating the last words spoken to her, and one about the
Sirens, who lure sailors to death with their enchanting singing—share
similarities in that both stories use “voice” as their intermediary.
What should be noted about this work other than the image on the
façade is the wall, which serves as the background for the images on the
canvases. Deriving the motif from an antique wallpaper he saw in a music video,
Woo produced a drawing of figures living in a cave along with plants and other
objects in fine lines reminiscent of classic etchings. He then turned the
drawing into a repeated pattern to print and use as a wallpaper for his
paintings. The repeated image on the wallpaper produced using an iPad and the
mythical motifs painted on the canvas stir up conversations and engage in
dialogues, drawing the viewer’s eyes in and out of the canvas frame.
Another thing to pay attention to in this exhibition is the fact
that fabric is a medium used for the first time by the artist. Using textiles
of various textures and colors, Woo materializes the sleek and rough tactility
and the exquisite feel of the sheen—qualities that cannot be fully demonstrated
through painting—into more than 10 installation pieces. The seams, created in
the process of the painted images transferring onto the patterned fabric and in
between one plane and another, are used as newly conceived lines—those
never-before-seen in his paintings.
It becomes evident that what Woo sought to convey through the
diverse selection of works presented in this exhibition is the fact that images
tend to be in motion. And discovered in the midst is Woo’s artistic attitude,
his search for new ways to treat the flat surface, using elements of design and
patterns without inhibition and experimenting with color, line, texture, and
supporting media, much like that of a navigator on a journey in search of his
lost voice.
