Exhibition Text — Encounter, Two Visions, 2024

 

ENG ∣ KOR

 

 

'Encounter, Two Visions'

 

 

Shin Hee Won (Gallery Doll  Curator)

 

 

Cho Eunjoung’s paintings are grounded in the observation of objects. Buildings appear in relation to nature, while staged figures are placed in harmony with them, forming scenes that remain within the realm of landscape. Within symbolic metaphors, objects create narratives through the artist’s subjective gaze, as if a novel were being written. Rather than being mixed together in a heterogeneous way, they come into harmony on the plane. Yet they soon enter an ambiguous atmosphere, connected in unfamiliar and fictional ways rather than through a consistent context.

 

In their trick-like quality, not easily grasped at once, unexpected encounters illuminate different parts of the picture. The objects that appear, whether seen from a distance or close up, seem to seek a certain plausibility among themselves. In recent works, movements such as eruption or the sensation of endlessly falling space have become restrained; instead, form emerges through a concentration on objects within the plane. A sandcastle may stand above rippling water, while the movement of a diver in a lake merely suggests direction. Like Magritte’s The Empire of Light, where day and night coexist, everyday life and memory return as sensation through an imagined wind.

 

As time accumulates, objects appear within space. The stories the artist wishes to create are therefore abundant, yet no clear cause, result, or event is visible. Although representation is present, the works seek to show the act of balancing that the artist has consistently pursued, through compositions that slightly twist reality. They speak of wavering, becoming still again, and regaining composure; they are not about trauma. Feelings that are sensed but cannot be fully explained gather as objects within Cho Eunjoung’s paintings. As an artist who observes the world, Cho reveals reality through her own sensibility. A dreamlike atmosphere may be bright, yet it soon enters darkness, and the desire to illuminate things clearly accumulates like the residue of the unconscious. In these scenes, the artist herself is found standing somewhere near a boundary.

 

The artist’s work presupposes a sense of anxiety. The various emotions that arrive as a mixture of fear, tension, and unfamiliarity are concretized on the plane as objects. As one form of living, the artist seeks to discover something that may be overcome, yet changes again when it encounters something new. At times, while examining the existence of the self, she objectifies realities as they are. When lack and fulfillment lead to desire, how far does anxiety extend? The painting may be the artist’s own story, yet it also discovers a narrative of relationships in which one cannot live alone.

 

Because it reveals a society that moves through interlocking relations, even when people do not know one another, objects create unexpected situations that could not have been imagined. The artist calmly suppresses her own emotions and looks into space. Without the regulations of society, the discovery of the unconscious may not have been possible. Reason, belief, and desire have moved toward the category of “we” and have also created the vastness called society, yet the place for the individual grows smaller and smaller. Within it, how should human beings live? The artist’s thought deepens.

 

If the fog is lifted, will we finally be able to see? This time, the dreamer has transformed into a diver and continues moving toward life. Who was it that called life a sea of suffering? Nevertheless, the strength that allows us to continue living ultimately comes from the immeasurable flow of time. We move forward, placing hope in an unpredictable future. Cho’s paintings envelop the things connected to life in a splendid atmosphere, allowing the inner self to settle. Knowing that human existence itself stands before an unavoidable fate, she persuades through painting, toward an acceptance of reality as it is.