2021 Young-Eun Museum Solo Exhibition -

2021 Young-Eun Museum Solo Exhibition

2021

Exhibition Title: EPICS./written by

tree Epic

Even if it's not a scientific book studying the spiritual world of plants, or even if you don't believe in superstitions about sacred trees,

I can sense that trees live together with humans between heaven and earth have souls.

They may not have been anywhere, but they hear, see, and feel news from the universe and the changes happening on Earth.

Amid the changes of stars, sun, and moon, listening to the stories brought by the wind and birds, the sound of rivers and waterfalls, and the waves of the sea,

one attains all the wisdom and the transience of life.

I discovered that I had engraved such changes and stories into my own body, recording in a deep and beautiful

epic how futile everything was.

Ever since I had lived for many years in the forests of a bird reserve by the sea and always eavesdropped on their conversations,

I knew the secret code written in the grain of the trees.

Accepting that they are destined beings to meditate, they generously give everything to the humans who survive together.

Humans would have cut down towering trees that have grown for decades or centuries for commercial purposes, loaded them onto lumber stores, and

sold them according to their use, without even knowing the meaning and narrative of the grain engraved on their bodies.

Just as all our fingerprints are different, I was amazed to see that wood grain also possesses a unique and unique character.

Artist Note

A Short Essay on My Work

2025

Under the premise that only purely sublimated artwork can commune with cosmic secrets, I contemplate, meditate, and execute my work. Around 2010, when The Red Book by Carl Jung—whom I deeply revere—was published, I was immersed in a profound study of his concept of the unconscious. Around that same time, I encountered The Secret Life of Plants by Peter Tompkins and Christopher Bird.

2025 Moran Museum of Art Solo Exhibition

The Return to the Natal River

2023

They say that salmon live in the ocean but return to their natal rivers—the very waters where they hatched and departed—to lay their eggs. It is said that after spawning, they tend to their newly hatched fry before they die. And of those fry, only about half manage to journey back to the sea. What drives them to undertake a voyage that demands such a risk of death? Where was that primal instinct nurtured, compelling them to brave the immense and treacherous ocean despite the peril?

2023 Yungeun Museum of Contemporary Art Special Exhibition II

The tree is also triangular.

2023

The tree is shaped like a triangle pointing toward the sky. Its roots are inverted triangles pointing downward, pushing deep into the ground. With the equilateral triangle upward, the inverted triangle downward, and the sky and earth connected, they achieve perfection and grow.

2023 Yungeun Museum of Contemporary Art Special Exhibition II

On the Spiritual World of Plants

2023

I have spent a lot of time in the forest for decades. The forest of trees feels like entering the Tibetan TONGLEN meditation monks' pond, existing with a whole-body sacrifice. Entering the forest, anyone opens their chest and follows the energy of their breath, feeling vitality and the joy of life, immersing themselves in meditation with the trees standing quietly in silence. They come to sense an unknown, transcendent power, spirituality, and an incomprehensible energy.

2023 Yungeun Museum of Contemporary Art Special Exhibition II

I think I was once a single fir tree in a past life.

2023

Since I was young, I have been deeply interested in trees and wildflowers. When I became a senior student in elementary school, I received a book called 'Plant Encyclopedia,' and I loved it so much that I never let go of it, carrying it everywhere, and whenever new flowers bloomed or new leaves appeared on trees, I would look at the book and study it alone. I didn't boast about it to anyone; I just felt proud and delighted knowing about the life of those plants. You can picture their beauty, see and smell them, and in spring, when you hold each tree and press your ears close, you can hear the sound of sap flowing. How excited and happy it was. Each tree had a strong and weak sound, and if no tree made any sound, I would often wonder why I might get sick.

2023 Yungeun Museum of Contemporary Art Special Exhibition II

Hoping that the message of their spirit etched in the grain of the wood will be revived.

2023

The trees in the forest were the closest friends of my soul in my life. If I sat quietly beside them, I could listen to the stories they heard from stars, wind, and clouds somewhere. We often hear stories of giant trees uprooted by heavy rain and typhoons somewhere, countless houses and people swept away by disasters, places where volcanic eruptions and shooting stars fell, and stories of stars happening across many universes. It was extremely difficult because I could not accept that it was a reality, not a dream. At first, I doubted myself out of fear that I had become a strange shaman, but now it has become part of my daily life in my secret forest, and I am very happy.

2023 Yungeun Museum of Contemporary Art Special Exhibition II

2021 Young-Eun Museum Solo Exhibition

2021

Even if it's not a scientific book studying the spiritual world of plants, or even if you don't believe in superstitions about sacred trees, I can sense that trees live together with humans between heaven and earth have souls. They may not have been anywhere, but they hear, see, and feel news from the universe and the changes happening on Earth.

To be mindful

2016

I am always observing the changes in my heart throughout life. Seeing the mind is to open it. When the door to a space is closed, it separates the inside and outside, but when the door is open, communication is smooth and there is no distinction. When the heart is open, inside and outside are no longer two. Like the structure of Möbius's strip symbolizing infinity, the midpoint that will become the door's location marks the point where the door is located, forming a seamless connection between inside and outside. Our thoughts can be said to be alive when we feel the operation of the five senses opening the door to the atmosphere and communicating with it. In that state, being mindful of what intention is acting as desire It can be said that you live as the master of your own life.

Artist's Notes Introduced into Modern Buddhism

2015

I live in a coastal forest where the wind drifts. The wind returns after circling the world, leaving a weary body as if lamenting the distant, unknown world, the beauty and pain of human life, and the transience of all things in this world, all with a low whistling sound.

Interview with Modern Buddhism Magazine (June Issue)

2015

Living Void, Triangle, Slavoye Žižek, Black House, Memory Treasury of Obsession, Friedrich Nietzsche, Kaleidoscope, Yogācāra, Zen Buddhism, Surrealism, René Magritte, Children's "Aha" Experience, Identity, Wonhyo, Mangong, Sondam Monk, Fairy Tale Book, Eric Fromm, Bill Viola, Ryu Si-hwa, Kahlil Jiburan, No Time No Place, Paul Tillich, Postmodernism...