[critic]Stone & Life, Sculptor of Thoughtness
Stone & Life, Sculptor of Thoughtness
Seok-Won Jang(an art critic, a professor in Chonnma National University)
A sculptor who has dealt with stones for about 20 years. He became a heavy and reliable existence like stone. The works such as ‘family’, ‘marriage’, ‘reading girl’ which he recently exhibited and made by mixing marble with bronze and marble with granite show popularity and marketability required by gallery space but he still insists his world in sculpture.
He showed his art world with sculpted works via his private exhibition before. The work like ‘both of me’ in 2003 described the me made of obsidian which is very hard, that is the person who thinks by standing with two feet and the person who stands upside down described anatomically. Such two persons are same ‘me’, are not separated, and are contradict. The work implies the matter and thought which he wanted to show as a sculpture. ‘Thoughtlessness’ series in 2006 advance the option for the thought. Healthy man’s body located like headless thinking Buddhist image or thinking person and shape of abstracted face with vacant brain space are the clues that his sculpture transfers to the invisible matter, ‘thoughtness’ beyond mass, plasticity, or visual dimension. His recent work, ‘life-city’ shows the urban feature emitting LED lights between the egg shaped broken gaps. It’s the city, the stone, and the concept. He continues to the experiment which the stone turns into object and concept beyond morphological illusion as a stone. ‘Floating island’ in 2005 is also designed that the stone on the water continues to be floating by making magnet to work with the current. He uses stones but he wants to avoid them.
Hang-Gyun Lee still experiments his own sculptures. In case of making ‘reading woman’ by mixing stone and bronze, he emphasized modelled skill of person which can be described with the material of bronze while added the sense of coarse and heavy material, the stone. Of course, such work shows his efforts to approach to the public. For his life, the sculpture is the reality. He had to continue the works endlessly, which was a true meaning of arts. Labor, technology, and thoughtness which should be given to the work were the necessary condition under working process and at the same time, they were elements to hinder the consistency. The truth which the sculptor wants to show and the touching which transfers such truth are still weakly experimental. One day, when such part will explode like volcano, all thoughtness, technology, and labor will prevail appreciating people and the sculptor himself like a flash light.
During 20 years, he has positioned as a great sculptor learnt from his great masters such as Gwan-Wook Gang, Roe-Jin Jeon, and Young-Won Kim. His works imply parts of inspirations and effects which were given by his masters. However, he pursues his own arts. He advances more & more firmly and diligently. However, he hopes to face the essential of matter more modestly and frankly.
He carved his family to flat stone with relief form. Once carved shape will be remained forever like the stone itself. Stone means the constancy with its hardness and continuity. As if the feeling of this moment would survive forever to its original spot… Stone language and senses & thoughtness which will be implied between the stone languages would be left as another things. What can we obtain from combination and incompatibility among them? Can we feel the arts within such delicate relation and difference?
Purity is not the first arts proposition any more. However, still arts have to show. Life and our era including purity… Now, all of us have to tell. About the sculptures or about arts… And also about the artist making such work and his family… Whether you hear or not such sounds, these are becoming arts tide flowing across our era.