[critic]Exhibition of the Art Works of Lee Haeng-Kyun
Exhibition of the Art Works of Lee Haeng-Kyun
Realistic Monument, created by Force and Skills and Refinement
Different from other genres, the sculpture requires the patience. In the other word, as the iron becomes stronger by repeated heating, hammering and soaking in water, the sculptors can be created by long discipline. Even with natural talents the efforts of cracking their own egg are to be advanced.
Lee is a born worker. For him the sculpture is just his daily life. In one word, he doesn’t pretend to be an artist. The evaluation of his works as a work of art is another issue beyond his hands. It may be so. He devotes himself to execute his given daily task. At least we cannot perceive the ostentation of himself as an artist in his works. They are the results from his working at the price of labors. And he adapts himself to those results.
He avoids the immediate description of formal beauty of body. It is from the fact that the pure nude works are not found in his. Of course, the pure nude work enters sometimes the stage. In that case, however, the authentic purity of the body is not his attractive material. It is just his formative approach that prefers the contents to forms. Nevertheless, the human body was minutely described as based on the exact anatomy. There is no other request than realistic description. Thus it was not accidental that he chose person’s hand as his main means of working.
His recent works are expressed in realistic forms if any. It is based on his strong belief that the realistic description of form is the essential force of the sculpture. Except for his realistic technique to push his work to the extreme, there is no idea or thought to be established. It is the precise and realistic technique realized by the intense mastership that he could be positioned in the Korea sculpture world.
We can witness his strong belief by saying that he has the pride as a most able student of Kang, Kwan-Wook who opened up an area of the Korean realistic sculpture. It is true. The power of realistic description doesn’t end simply in its functional completion. The more precise the technique is, the higher refined the beauty of form becomes. In his works, we can perceive the refinement realizing the sense of beauty forward the formative as beyond simple manual functionality.
Among his works, trap of love and hatred (man>woman), trap of love and hatred (man<woman) Two Me’s and Negation of thinking system were expressed by the parallel location of two bodies or by the introduction of the different materials of complex structure such as wood or stone and then inquired the inner world of the personality by the complex structure. It results in inquiring the complexity of men’s psychological world with double-minded or complex thinking functions. As shown in his works, he throws a light on the inner world of human body. He pays attention to the fact that the outside appearance such as movement and facial impression are just the expression of the inner world of men.
Thus, he follows the logic that the works of form is that the mind and sentiment employ the body. It is his own process to confirm the fact that there is no external form without connection to inner world. By understanding the principle of body dominated by mind and sentiment, he secures the formative necessity.
The series of works Happiness Anger Love and Pleasure ‘喜’ ‘怒’ ‘愛’ ‘樂’(희노애락) reflect clearly his vision. He wants to show expressly the facial impression indicated by the sentiment. It is very interesting to replace Sadness by Love. Thus he focuses on the concrete and real world instead of sentimental one like paintings. These works focused on the sentimental expression show the merit of the cubic existence occupying the real space. By describing the extreme sentiments in realistic way, the visual image was persuasively strengthened.
Meanwhile, the Family S, Our family and Kkubi in form of portraits are new materials concerned by him. The natural expression and appearance of these works can be compared with the detailed description of paintings. In some way, they are deeply attractive with realistic form against the paintings with one touch. But the degree of technical completion is to be supported in the portrait work with stone.
The detailed description in portrait sculpture can be realized by his technique to expand the expression area. Anyway, his thought is based on settling the sculpture in the portrait form as well as the paintings. There are, however, the traditional ways of portrait as the form of memorial sculpture but they are in strict format and cannot overcome it. In other words, the sculpture of portrait in natural expression and posture focusing on the reality as their existence is absolutely required.
Here, the relieves, Our family and Sisyphos, are newly concerned by him. In reality they are treated as the memorial sculpture and not studied in positive way. As shown in Rodin’s Door of the hell, the efficiency and value of the relief has many programmatic applications. He searches for the possibility of the sculpture of portrait.
This time, he paralleled his work with the abstract work on the theme of Dustbin. They are derived from the works of Anger, Love and Trap of love and hatred. They are expressed by the pieces of marble and wires put in concrete form of cylinder. This work is the environment-friendly and has the position of independent abstractness. It is very characteristic that the simple idea is connected to the real sculpture.
The sense of the simplification and distortion of human body is exceptional. It has the sense of beautiful proportionality. Therefore, when this domain is focused on, the unique formativeness can be realized. He is so talented and has many missions. But since he has the time and force to express himself in him, I expect that his artistic talents will be in full bloom under various views.
Shin, Hang-Sup (Critic of Art)