Solo Exhibitions (Brief)

Kim has held solo exhibitions include 《Body Echo: Spreading from Emptiness》 (CORD, Seoul, 2025), 《MIKI KIM EXHIBITION》 (Waiting Room, Taipei, 2024), and 《SKIN+INKS》 (Watermark Gallery, Seoul, 2024). She is currently presenting the solo exhibition 《Escape Emotion – My Journey》 at POPOTAME Books & Art in Tokyo.

Group Exhibitions (Brief)

She has also participated in exhibitions and fairs such as 《Tokio Art Book Fair 2025》 (Shiba Park Hotel, Tokyo, 2025), 《The Preview Seongsu 2025》 (S Factory, Seoul, 2025), and 《Time in the Middle》 (Eulji Arts Center, Seoul, 2021).  

Originality & Identity

Miki Kim’s work begins with an exploration of the point where the body, emotion, and image intersect. Working as both a tattooist and illustrator, she understands the surface of the body—skin—as a space for images, continuously questioning how art can connect with life. Although her practice expands across various media such as painting, digital drawing, tattooing, and ceramics, at its core lies an interest in how images function within an individual’s life and emotional landscape. In early drawings such as Drosera Rotundifolia(2022) and Tears of Flowers(2022), forms of plants and bodies intertwine, presenting scenes that symbolically reveal states of life and emotion.
 
The artist often addresses the boundaries between humans and nature, living beings and objects through hybrid imagery that combines different entities. The ‘Orchid Flower Mantis Human’(2023) series presents figures formed through the merging of orchids and praying mantises, imaginatively exploring questions of human identity and the transformative possibilities of the body. Similarly, drawings such as Wild Orchid Flowers(2024) and Orchid Flower Mantis Human combine organic plant structures with the human body to create life forms that could not exist in reality. While grounded in surreal imagination, these images simultaneously suggest human emotion, desire, and the instability of existence.
 
This line of inquiry becomes more explicit in the solo exhibition 《SKIN+INKS》(Watermark Gallery, 2024). Centered on tattoo practice, the exhibition examined the relationship between the acts of drawing and inscribing. For the artist, skin is not merely a surface but a site where time and experiences accumulate, and tattoos are “living images” engraved upon it. In this sense, her work focuses not on images as autonomous artworks, but on how they transform and expand within the life of the person who carries them.
 
In her more recent work, this interest extends toward themes of chance and meditation. The exhibition 《Body Echo: Spreading from Emptiness》(CORD, Seoul, 2025), which presented both the ‘Suminagashi’ series and ceramic works, foregrounded the process of image formation beyond intention and control. Through traces of ink naturally spreading across water and ceramics resembling weathered stones, the artist explored the beauty emerging from chance and the quiet sensations of inner stillness.

Style & Contents

Miki Kim’s work is characterized by delicate lines, symmetrical structures, and vivid colors. Her drawings combine organic elements such as orchids, bones, animals, and plants to create images that resemble newly imagined life forms. This visual language is evident in works like Drosera Rotundifolia and Orchid Flower Mantis Human, where the subjects do not strictly follow biological structures but instead appear as beings reconstructed through imagination. Decorative patterns inspired by neo-tribal aesthetics and metallic ornaments add a distinctive visual tension to these images.
 
Her work also incorporates visual sensibilities rooted in East Asian artistic traditions. Symbolic compositions found in Korean folk painting, the flat color planes of Japanese woodblock prints, and ornamental forms from Chinese ceramics merge with contemporary drawing. These elements also appear in her collaborations with global brands. In a large-scale illustration created with Adidas Originals, figures wearing contemporary fashion appear against a background featuring the Ten Symbols of Longevity, creating scenes where tradition and modern imagery coexist.
 
In recent years, her practice has expanded into new media. The ‘Suminagashi’ series, based on the traditional Japanese marbling technique, is created by transferring ink patterns that spread across the surface of water onto paper or fabric. This process introduces chance—beyond the artist’s control—as a central element of the work. At the same time, ceramic works such as Ceramic Ornament(2025) evoke natural stones or coastal rocks, bringing the material presence and temporal qualities of nature into the work.
 
These formal explorations extend into exhibition spaces as well. In 《Body Echo: Spreading from Emptiness》, ceramics and the ‘Suminagashi’ works were arranged within a spatial setting inspired by a Japanese karesansui garden. Meanwhile, the exhibition 《괴》(Damn Good Seoul, 2025) featured Glass Woman(2025), a work referencing idol imagery from Japan’s bubble economy era. In this work, the fragmented face of a female figure appears repeatedly refracted through multiple glasses. The scene simultaneously reflects the dazzling surface of image consumption culture and the anxiety underlying it.

Topography & Continuity

Miki Kim’s practice has developed through a flexible structure that moves across tattooing, illustration, and exhibition-based work. While many contemporary artists develop their work within a single medium, Kim treats various surfaces—including skin, digital screens, paper, ceramics, and exhibition spaces—as environments for images. This approach allows her work to move fluidly between art and everyday life, as well as between artistic practice and cultural industries.
 
What distinguishes her work is its focus on how images are experienced. Tattoos are images that live together with a person’s body; drawings circulate as visual language within digital environments; ceramics and the ‘Suminagashi’ works reflect the temporality and unpredictability of nature. Although these works use different media, they are connected through a shared emphasis on sensory experience and emotional resonance.
 
The artist’s range of activities reflects this characteristic as well. She has participated in art fairs and exhibitions such as 《Tokio Art Book Fair 2025》(Shiba Park Hotel, Tokyo, 2025) and 《The Preview Seongsu 2025》(S Factory, Seoul, 2025), while also collaborating with fashion brands including Gucci, Marine Serre, and Adidas, and producing illustrations for international media such as The New York Times. These activities demonstrate how her imagery can operate simultaneously within the fields of art and popular culture.
 
Miki Kim’s work ultimately forms an open structure that is difficult to define within a single genre or medium. Images that began with tattoo practice extend into drawing, installation, and ceramics, while images originating from the body continue into exhibition spaces and various media to create new forms of experience. Through this evolving process, her work continues to explore the point where the body, emotion, nature, and image intersect.