Solo Exhibitions (Brief)

Since his solo exhibition at Kumho Museum of Art in 1994, Kim Eull has held numerous solo exhibitions at major institutions in Korea—including the Chosun Ilbo Art Gallery(2018), where his Lee Jung-seob Art Award exhibition was presented, as well as SAVINA Museum(2025) and Project Space SARUBIA(2002)—and at international galleries such as Kunsträume Michael Horbach(Cologne, 2018), and BAIK ART (LA, 2015), through which he has continuously explored visual thought, narrative, and the boundaries of images, with a particular focus on drawing.

Group Exhibitions (Brief)

He has participated in numerous major group exhibitions at institutions such as the National Museum of Modern and Contemporary Art(2016, 2011, 2006), Ilwoo Space(2016), Seongnam Arts Center(2015), Nam June Paik Art Center(2013), OCI Museum of Art(2012), ARKO Art Center(2009), and Gyeonggi Museum of Modern Art(2007).

Awards (Selected)

He received the 30th Lee Jung-seob Art Award in 2018 and was shortlisted as a finalist for the 《2016 Korea Artist Prize》 at the National Museum of Modern and Contemporary Art in 2016.

Residencies (Selected)

He was selected to participate in PSB (CAN Foundation Artist Residency, Project Space in Beijing) in China, Gyeonggi Creation Center in Ansan, Korea, and the Gyeongju International Residency Art Festa in Korea.

Collections (Selected)

His works are held in the collections of major public institutions including the National Museum of Modern and Contemporary Art, Seoul Museum of Art, Gyeonggi Museum of Modern Art, Busan Museum of Art, Gwangju Museum of Art, Osan Museum of Art, ARKO Art Center, and Kumho Museum of Art, as well as international institutions such as BAIK ART (USA), KUNSTRAUME Cologne (Germany), and Dulwich College Seoul (UK).

Originality & Identity

In Kim Eull’s practice, identity is less a fixed theme than a structural question that sustains his artistic inquiry. His early ‘Self-Portrait’ series pursued the question of who he was and where he stood through painting, while the subsequent ‘Blood Map’ series expanded this inquiry toward family lineage, ancestry, and place. From the early 2000s onward, however, as drawing became central to his work, Kim shifted away from defining identity toward revealing the process through which identity emerges, fluctuates, and dissolves. For him, drawing registers immediate encounters between the self and the external world, accumulating bodily movement and lived time. Identity thus appears not as a resolved statement, but as an ongoing condition—continuously formed through perception, action, and repetition. This approach allows Kim’s work to remain deeply personal while resonating on a broader, shared experiential level.

Style & Contents

Drawing occupies a central position in Kim Eull’s practice, functioning not as a preparatory step but as a direct intersection of thought and bodily action. He understands drawing less as a formal category than as an attitude—one that allows instinctive, physical responses to emerge freely. Lines, text, and found objects coexist on paper, extending drawing beyond conventional boundaries into painting, sculpture, and installation. Rather than prioritizing formal resolution or technical mastery, Kim emphasizes process, repetition, and even failure as essential components of meaning. Through this approach, drawing becomes a flexible field that mediates between art and everyday life.

Topography & Continuity

Despite shifts in medium and form, Kim Eull’s practice is marked by a strong sense of continuity. His transition from painting to drawing following a studio fire in the late 1990s did not signal a rupture, but rather a sustained commitment to a consistent artistic attitude. Since 2001, his long-term drawing projects have incorporated time, labor, and the body as integral elements of the work. The repetitive, daily act of drawing aligns art with the rhythms of lived experience, rendering his oeuvre as an accumulative self-portrait. This constancy positions Kim’s practice as an enduring artistic endeavor rather than a series of isolated outcomes.