Heejoon Lee (South Korea) believes painting can offer a space for reflection and exchange; it can serve as a unique way to view the world, understand contemporary values, and continue its role as a critical visual language. In today’s digital age and rapid pace of change, he reconsiders painting as an alternative medium that captures the senses of our time and space.
Throughout his residency at Delfina Foundation, he plans to collect data for his future practice. He sees London as a city where the past and present coexist, with multi-dimensional layers of time, space, and history. Heejoon plans to visit archaeological museums, historical monuments, and natural sites within the city to gather textures of different times and spaces for future paintings.
Heejoon Lee’s practice began with his deep affection for and interest in painting as a way to understand and interpret his surroundings. Since his first solo exhibition in 2016, his work has focused on the interaction between architectural spaces and urban systems. From the streets of the city, he discovered layers of time and color planes in the urban environment, reconstructing them into geometric forms on canvas. Since the pandemic, when face-to-face interactions were replaced with virtual and immaterial experiences, he has, paradoxically, felt a stronger desire to engage with physical materials. The joy of mixing paint, constructing visual elements, and spending time looking at them has been his response to today’s constant change and acceleration.
Heejoon was born in Seoul and currently lives and works in Seoul, South Korea.
With support from:
SONGEUN Art and Cultural Foundation and Delfina’s Network of Asia-Pacific Patrons
Artist’s website
Tags
Please note all artist-in-residence biographies are accurate at the time of their residency. For up-to-date bios please visit the artist’s website.