Gallery Chang will present a two-person exhibition featuring Korean and American art masters Kang Yong Kim and Shane Guffogg at ‘Gallery Chang-Seoul’ in the Oakwood Premier COEX Center this October.
This exhibition, titled “Infinite Dialogue,” unfolds as a “philosophical dialogue” in which two masters from the East and the West exchange questions and answers in their own languages.
For over 50 years, artist Kim Kang Yong has explored the essence of existence and perception through the everyday material of "bricks." His works, built of sand and shadows, are not simply objects, but are considered spaces for philosophical contemplation, questioning the very act of seeing.
Artist Shane Guffogg has built a world of works that cross the boundaries of light and time, science and art, based on the fundamental question of “how can time and space be compressed into a single moment?”
Last year, Guffogg held a solo exhibition titled "At the Still Point of the Turning World – Strangers of Time" at the Scala Contarini del Bovolo Museum in Venice, in line with the official theme of the 60th Venice Biennale, "Stranieri Ovunque – Foreigners Everywhere." At the time, he garnered international attention for incorporating the Biennale's critical thinking into the concept of "strange time," and was featured prominently by international media outlets, including the BBC.
This Seoul exhibition intersects Guffogg's global projects with Kim Kang Yong's long-standing exploration, posing the question, "What does it mean to see?" to Korean audiences. This two-person exhibition will begin in Seoul and continue with a New York exhibition in 2026, aiming to expand the artistic discourse connecting Korea and the United States.
Chang JunHwan, the head of the gallery, said, “We have been promoting a two-way exchange by introducing Korean artists in New York and world-renowned masters in Korea,” and added, “This exhibition will be a place to intensively demonstrate that identity and an opportunity to prove the status of Korean art on a global scale.”
Artist Kim Kang Yong (75) has declined to respond to requests from renowned international art museums and global IT companies simply seeking to acquire his work. Instead, he actively engages with Korean galleries abroad, where language barriers are a barrier, and focuses his efforts on this. This year, he has solo exhibitions scheduled in Singapore and New York.
The artist has been creating and exhibiting in New York, USA and Beijing, China for over ten years since 2004, and he prides himself on keeping abreast of international politics and the global art market.
Western painting, represented by canvas and paint, first arrived in this land during the Japanese colonial period. Following the turmoil of liberation and the Korean War, modern, contemporary, and contemporary art trends were introduced, sometimes in reverse order. First-generation artists found it difficult to even grasp the material properties of viscous paint.
Kim Kang-yong, originally from Jeongeup, North Jeolla Province, entered university in Seoul in 1971, a relatively young age. It was a time when domestically produced oil paints were just becoming widely available. In 1976, after returning to school after completing his military service, he released his first series of hyper-realistic brick paintings, "Reality+Place."
"Amid student protests against the Yushin dictatorship and rapid industrialization, working conditions for workers were dire. I wanted to reflect the circumstances of the times in my work."
The poem 'Grass' (1964), published in the posthumous collection of works by poet Kim Su-yeong (1921-1968), 'Giant Roots, 1974', became the motif for this work.
The grass lies down / Swaying in the gust of wind that brings rain / The grass lies down / Finally it cried / The day was cloudy so it cried more / Then it lay down again…
Kim Kang-yong created a meadow by drawing individual green blades of grass. Just as he drew the grass, his eyes were drawn to the bricks formed by sand. He depicted the mortar (also known as brocade) and reddish-brown bricks of construction sites visible everywhere, and the mortar flowing between the bricks.
In the 1990s, Kim Kang-yong transitioned to the "Reality+Image" series. For the previous 25 years, he had painted exclusively in monotone sand.
Since opening a studio in New York City in the 2000s, the artist has advanced to a level where he blurs the lines between figurative and abstract art. His first studio was an officetel in Dumbo, Brooklyn, a neighborhood teeming with galleries and artist studios. His first exposure to the advanced commercial gallery system came in 2006, when he held a solo exhibition at Neuhoff Gallery in Chelsea.
Since the 19th century, Dumbo and the Williamsburg area to the north have been warehouses and factories. Architectural features, influenced by 1950s Brutalism, include exposed red brick facades, exterior steel staircases and balconies, and large windows. The surroundings of the studio inspired the artist's work, which boldly incorporated color, breaking away from the monochromatic approach of sand-colored tones, thickness, and texture. Three years later, the artist relocated his studio to West New York, just across the Hudson River.
In 2008, when China was focusing its national efforts on the Beijing Olympics, his wife, artist Kim In-ok (70), opened a gallery and studio in the Dashanzi 798 Art Zone in Beijing to support their daughter's studies there. Kim Gam-yong began traveling between studios in both New York and Beijing. In the summer of 2014, with his daughter completing her studies, he withdrew from the Beijing gallery and studio, and also closed down his New York studio, returning to Hanggeum-ri, Yangpyeong, Gyeonggi Province, where he had settled in 1990.
About two years ago, I asked the artist why he painted one or two bricks (cubes), and he showed me an image of his first sculptural motif: a series of gray-white monotone cubes arranged in rows or parallel rows.
“I didn’t draw it with the intention of drawing it, but it ended up like that because I was using it for formative purposes.”
It didn't take long to realize the question was flawed. The word "mandala," originating in Hinduism, is a combination of the Sanskrit words "manda" and "la." "Manda" means center or essence, and "la" means completion. A "mandala" is a painting, a symbol, or icon that embodies the invisible mind. I should have asked, "What are you sitting at your easel trying to complete?"
“I don’t paint bricks,”
he says, even saying, “I have nothing to do with bricks.”
When I first met him about 15 years ago, the artist (now I think about it) painted an unrealistic fantasy of hundreds of cubes stacked high, seemingly bricks. He later focused on cohesively composing the entire canvas, eventually moving on to works featuring only one or two cubes.
Ahead of his New York exhibition last fall, the artist developed his so-called "Potbelly" work from six or seven years ago, which collapsed the cubic lines at the bottom of the canvas. By narrowing the subject, the modules, which form a sturdy wall on the canvas, appear as weapons in themselves, possessing a weighty mass on the verge of being thrown out. It seemed to be an attempt to break free from the idea of completing the canvas, to escape the screen and the canvas.
Kim Kang-yong's work is undergoing a transformation, this time to escape the temptation of self-replication. Some critics have labeled his work as simple and straightforward, but this stems from the preconceptions surrounding the central figure and subject matter of one or two cubic figures. He is now returning to compositions characterized by clusters of cubic figures. He also includes works where cubic figures overlap with one another.
He is well aware that he is not immune to the label of "brick artist." Because his paintings originated from the bricks themselves, he understands bricks (cubics) as his identity. He says, "All of [the artist's] actions are woven into it." Newness is something always different every day.
"Yesterday's painting is today's sketch. My paintings (or perhaps they were in the past) have nothing to do with divine revelation or inspiration. If I don't paint every day, the next one won't connect."
Ultimately, Kim Kang-yong seems to be pushing even the brushstrokes that depict only the shadows of the cubic zirconia into the canvas, using an inlay technique, like an underlay. What does "seeing" mean? Just as we understand one or two as a unit of a collection, the "shadow of the object" seems to shift to the perception that it exists beyond the colored sand held together by glue.
Among the hyperrealist artists who emerged in the 1970s and 1980s, Kim Kang-yong is the only one who has completely broken away from the conventions of form, production method, and materials. He began painting before his teens, and has always been curious about new trends and the work of other artists. He has never been afraid to live abroad, especially in the United States and China. He doesn't drink alcohol, focusing solely on the study of painting.
He also has a strong sense of realism, having endured the life of an artist for over 30 years, working as an art studio instructor, private tutor, art high school teacher, university lecturer, and graduate school professor, in a time when it was impossible to make a living solely from selling paintings.
Art has long been a hegemonic tool of cultural imperialism and commercialism. Like the Olympics or the World Cup, it also has a strong national competitive nature. Each country showcases its cultural prowess by hosting art events like international biennales.
It's impossible for a nation to cultivate artists like athletes in a training center. Those who dedicate themselves to the ultramarathon of life, dedicating 50 years to the art world, and ultimately cultivate their own brand are a rare breed throughout history.
Beyond their inherent mission of creation, artists harbor ambitions for achievement. Their ongoing transformation is a practice of the artistic philosophy that "the exhibition hall (when a work is displayed) should never be boring."
In the era of cultural hegemony, Kim Kang-yong is also exploring new collaborations with influential partners in the global art world.
by. Jung Taek Shim / https://www.newsverse.kr/news/articleView.html?idxno=7586