Abby Robinson_Photographer /
2003
/
To appreciate Woo Young Kim's work requires an agile mind, an exploratory nature, and an open heart. These are necessary because his photographs are at once serene and disturbing, requiring attention be paid to small, often overlooked but not inconsequential objects.
But it is precisely these details that loom largest, that wind up embodying the most profound meaning. That raises in the subtlest and gentlest ways the issue of life and death. Kim was trained as an architect and this has much to do with the way he builds a picture. First he lays what looks like a simple foundation only to design a structure of meticulous delicacy upon it. So he turns the architectonics of his photographs into a meditation. To understand his visual language, you have to think in realities.
Looking at one of Kim's images, you're struck first with its beauty-the harmony of its components, the sensuousness of the color, the graceful interplay of form. The images radiate a quiet intensity along with an intense quiet. Your eye slides effortlessly from part to part, initially lulling you into a contemplation of beauty. But then the images become more demanding. They compel you to travel beyond your first impressions and to recognize the depth of their complexity.
And once you've engaged in what can only be themed as a visual quest, the real beauty and exquisite sadness of the work are made manifest. Only then do you feel Kim's enormous love and respect for nature and his mournfulness over the way it is made artificial. Yet. I don't mean to make the work sound merely cerebral and bleak. Not at all. There is tremendous breadth of emotion to be found here. It is one thing to analyze how the lower right-hand panel in "SILENCE I" swirls, its inclusion making it seem as if the earth easily whirls out of control. Certainly it’s possible to experience aesthetic pleasure in the graphic arrangement of images, comparing the swirling panel with the other, more grounded ones; it is a very different thing to describe the emotive experience that swirling evokes, how it not only resonates with chaos but also possibility and change.
Or take "CAN" with its array of rocks-one natural, one manmade yet strangely beautiful, and one ghostly with markings that look mysteriously totemic-that reflect the continuum of time. However, there in the middle is a Coke-another totem. The can itself is disturbing, and unavoidable sign of litter and commercialism. But Kim doesn't let you dismiss it merely as a symbol of urban decay. The red of the can is simultaneously a wonderful insertion of color and a sly infusion of humor.
So ultimately, Kim's work takes you on a journey that leads you through sadness, and at times even despair, but eventually back to hope. The pictures, seemingly so site specific, manage to transcend geographic boundaries. While intimately bound to the particular, they strive for the universal. They are a warning and a salute, a message and meditation for all of us.
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To appreciate Woo Young Kim's work ...
Abby Robinson, Photographer
2003