Byeon, Sook kyoung

Preface for Byeon Sook-kyoung

Unbearable Heaviness of Being

1.

Originally, fine art featured a phenomenological contradiction.

The attitude of fine art indicating 'so' by showing itself as 'not so' was relatively appreciated by Aristotle, but it had been an unbearable illusion to his senior Plato. As such, fine art has been placed lowest in the system of truth constructed by human beings.

Art is not a truth itself; it only indicates a truth. The mediation on the time-honored realism has been based on such theory of contradiction. The contemporary fine art has grown assuming the 'fact' that it is an illusion. It originates from the meditation on the theory of contradiction superimposed on the system of truth. Its hither-to achievements are the historical results from the unnecessary agony by aesthetics and art philosophy over two millennia. The author admits that art is a beautiful (or charming) lie, while approaching the existence of art and its ontology.

If you feel it too difficult to understand, the author will express it differently by using Sophists' rhetoric. Namely, while a lie is accepted as a lie, a tacit familiarity and social relationship between speaker and listener is formed. To put it more plainly, let's lie friendly and with smile and then, accept it. Namely, art is a sophisticated and logical 'fraud.'

2.

Artist Byeon Sook-kyoung's work is too heavy. The structure formed of iron plates and beams weighs more than one tone in some cases. Her work is still light, compared with Richard Serra's, but the sense of weight is relative depending on works. For example, if a water ox is as heavy as 500 kilo grams, we are not surprised, just nodding. However, if a field mouse weighs 50 kilo grams, we must be alarmed. Art just touches the latter. Due to such difference of sense, Byeon Sook-kyoung's works cannot but look heavy. Now, the author feels necessary for some specific explanation. She found a spider's web in a quiet corner at dawn.

The spider's web too incomplete and loose might have evoked a sense of aesthetics for her. The artist was charmed by it. She saw a force penetrating and splitting the space in the strings set between thick reinforcing rods or between concrete columns or walls, feeble and transparent enough to be breakable even by the wind.

3.

On the other hand, the artist borrows a principle of configuration from structural aesthetics and architectural attribute of the spider's web. The strings combined to support their too feeble structure bear the wind and ignore the desperate struggle of the insects trapped therein. In addition, the firmness of the strings dividing the air may well connote some sense of self-control as well as the integrity championed by Classicism. The artist represents such formativeness with iron. The artist is bold and reckless enough to challenge the theory of contradiction discussed above by the author.

She imports the form too light to be weighed into a material as heavy as a ton. Byeon Sook-kyoung's work may well be characterized by a setting indicating a being lighter than the Kleenex tissue. And such indicativeness is highlighted again by some decorative or rhetoric shape inherent in her work.

4.

The art works which have become so beautiful lies begin to attach law and rhythm to the variable forms of Nature. Repetition and changes begin to vary within a kind of harmonic structure. The resultant ensembles will have their own meaning. In order to form such ensembles, the artist leaves her work again to the accidentiality of Nature. A series of works are processed in an almost same way, namely, heated in a kiln. Here, the human intention does not affect the dynamics of the heat. Now, the artist waits for the results of accidentality, sitting beside the kiln like a ceramist. The minute differences caused by accidentality form a rhythm in repetition. Here, the artist always seems to see other spider's nets, being reminded of the aesthetic law of Nature structured therein.

5.

The theory of contradiction developed by Byeon Sook-kyoung's work does not only involve its sense of weight. The contrasting inversion of space and substance forms another axis of such theory. The thin strings of the spider's web are transformed into the crevices crossing the heavy iron sheets. The lines penetrating the plane of the frame are often extended beyond the limit of the frame. Namely, her work with its physical limit determined becomes a part of an invisible whole as well as a part visualized. Thus, her work is given a meaning as a kind of indicator hinting at the whole. In this way, her work exchanges frequently with the external open space as well as with the voids within itself. The communication transcends the space to be formed as a shadow or a second formal element derived from the work. The form created by the lights penetrating the work and its shadow is projected into the space to turn the work from 'being-in-itself' to 'being for itself,' or set a reciprocity.

6.

Lastly, We need to pay attention to the fact that Byeon Sook-kyoung's work has a simple architectural form. Such architectural attribute may be comparable to her former minimalism works, but it must differ from the minimalism expressed as an extreme reductionism. To the contrary, Byeon Sook-kyoung's work spins off meanings 'positively,' probably because she borrows her motif directly from Nature but primarily because she composes continuity and difference of forms in the process of transposing them into some material ones. For example, unlike Sol LeWitt's or Carl Andre's works with their modules repeating too inhumane and unnatural forms, Byeon Sook-kyoung' work features a lyrical emotion woven on the iron. And her work obeys the irregular changes of Nature. Hence, the artist gains a force not contracting but expanding. As if she were Arachne (a woman who turned into a spider in the Greek myth), Byeon Sook-kyoung knows how to express the tenacious life of Nature as a crystallization on the cool substance and thereby, weave the epic contents thereupon. The author feels heavier for being and meaning of the lines dividing the space rather than for the iron mass or the primary material of her work.

                         

Lines Drawn in the Sky

Discovery, Straight Lines

Choi Tae-man/Art Critic

The outstanding characteristics found in Byeon Sook-kyoung's works are the straight lines crossing or dividing the surface of the cube. Except for the edges shaping either cube or disc, these straight lines are oblique lines mostly; few lines are in parallel.

So, the planes in a rectangle or a circle look even like the broken fragments. The cracks created by such straight lines not only divide the space but also highlight the planes lifted like the layers elevated by a diastrophism only to escalate the visual tension. Hence, the world in the geometric framework looks like an arena where some dynamic energies struggle with each other.

The planes divided by the oblique lines are neither uniform in size nor regular in form, and therefore, they might well look like some disorderly structures. However, if you understand from what motive these straight lines start, you may well know that what forms the structure is not a chaos. Such attribute of Byeon Sook-kyoung's works must be a clue to the argument that what a simple conclusion it would be to define her basic form as 'minimalism' on the ground that it is a geometric cube. First of all, we can find a clue in the theme 'Dawn,' The artist says that she found a spider's thread wet with the dew at dawn after she had sat up all night thinking about her works. A spider's thread is found frequently around us, so we may overlook it. But she found a structure created by Nature.

In fact, the spider's web we know is a radial net functioning as a trap in most cases.

Since the round net laid out by a spider looks like a regular wheel, it has a regular proportion. In addition, the unique structure converging toward the center resembles the vanishing point of the perspective much.

However, it is said that the spiders' nets differ in shape depending on their species: crescent, triangle, fan, etc.

In some cases, shelf-like or plate-like or bowl-like net laid out on the wall or between furnitures has an irregular structure. What is interesting is that Byeon Sook-kyoung uses such spider's net as the motive for her straight lines. She does not arbitrarily transform the structure but expands the original form and thereby, links it with iron or copper plate cuts.

So, it is little exaggerating to say that the designer is a spider determining the basic structure. Indeed, we tend to dismiss the spiders as the harmful insects to be exterminated, while feeling desolate for their webs laid out in less visible corners or rims, and therefore, we do not probably appreciate Byeon Sook-kyoung's discovery of spiders' webs. Although her discovery may not be comparable to Archimedes' discovery of 'the principle of buoyancy - he cried 'eureka' upon discovering it - it is important for her to find a principle of forms in the very trifle phenomenon. Just as 'the cobweb theorem' in economics is applied to analyze the phenomenon of the prices fluctuating due to the unbalance between demand and supply, so a natural phenomenon may well often provide for a clue to the understanding of a complex structure.

  

Byeon Sook-kyoung seems to get an idea from the irregular structure of the spider's web, as shown in her oblique lines crossing each other. Thus, her works show us a world of the aesthetic combinations, evoking 'a rule in the misrule,' 'a balance in the dissolution' or 'an order in the disorder.' 'An order in the disorder' is implied in Chaos theory or Fractal geometry. It is just the principle of dividing the rectangle frames, and the result is a jigsaw puzzle. The basic forms of such jigsaw puzzle are not invented by the artist but found by her in the nature, and in this regard, we may well call her works 'discovered abstraction.'

There is no room for the metaphysics to infiltrate into, and therefore, any symbol is rejected. However, although the artist has found a motif in the spider's web, it is just a source of her works, not representing her entire art work. Then, we need to make clear what the artist wants to tell us through this spider's web structure.

Interstice between of Cracks, Windpipe of Tension and Relaxation

At a glance, irregular oblique lines cross each other dizzily, but in her works, the triangle is the basic form, surrounded by the polygons; sometimes, the polygons are placed appropriately. Since such forms are oriented toward the center, our eyes are naturally focused on the center. In this center, small fragments or cuts are grouped in diverse colors, so our eyes are not dispersed but converged on the center.

The harmony between the wide planes on the edge and the complex structure in the center must be a factor not dispersing her works visually but stabilizing them. The disc type has a clear contour, and therefore, it serves to contain our eyes in the round space.

However, the inside is complex like a broken glass lens, and thus, a cyclic structure between tension and relaxation is formed. In contrast, the symmetric structure in the rectangle gives a rhythm to the disturbing oblique lines caused by the inside crack. In addition, the gorgeous colors on the surface act to turn her works into sculptural paintings or painting-like sculptures. Although such colors interrupt our exploration into the inside structure, the contrast of coloration is outstanding, opening up the closed spaces or closing the open spaces.

Accordingly, activation of the space restrained by colors is equal to the crack dividing it, and as a result, a kind of windpipe is created; it is not simply a crevice between planes. Crack does not separate the spaces but link them. Namely, it is a medium as well as a way guiding our eyes. While rectangle or circle has the attribute of regressing to its prototype because it is highly self-perfecting, crack is interrupted in its recovery to a stable form.

Such interruption is a factor preventing her works from being stabilized in a space closed by a minimalism impulse. Here, a tension rises. The tension is also a force driving the fragments to be assembled in an aesthetic dimension.

The process of dividing and reassembling the planes require an aesthetic judgement different from the instinctive act of the spider weaving its house. Furthermore, the form protruded from the divided planes is another important element determining her works as sculpture. In other words, her consideration of forms is important in the process. After all, her works rely on cubes or geometric supports, but they are just supports literally; they are not the contents of the works. Namely, the artist does not stick to the contour determining the form of her works but urges us to look into the inside through the fragments and the crack across between them. Of course, the inside is void physically.

What we should look into is not the inside of the box but the interstice space between cracks. Although it is very narrow, the interstice space is a key to understand not only the structure of the cube but also the principle forming the structure. In this sense, the spider's web becomes important again as the motif of her works. It is a net catching the world. In addition, its strand may be regarded as a line of Fate like the palm line in that it connotes many stories.

The structure of her works expanding the spider's web excludes any symbol but a metaphor may be allowed in the process of reassembling the fragmented forms. The fragments are not precisely reassembled with such hi-tech tools as laser, or they are not easily recovered to their original assembly or a plane. The sharp-angled planes are tilted to be cubes, while the planes divided with colors are re-defined. Thus, her works are entitled to justify themselves as the cubes compressing the structure of Nature.

If she has discovered a geometric structure created by Nature through the spider's web she found at dawn, her works may well be the windows through which we can look into the world. While spiders spin the threads from inside their bodies as much as their webs can be supported by gravity, the artist may want to draw the lines in the sky by referring to the webs.

When the lines are linked with each other, they may form a net containing the sky. Although her works are assembled of the heavy metals, we are happy to imagine them as the windows to the world as well as the net catching the air.

 



Byun, Sook - Kyung

BFA, Dept. of Sculpture, College of FineArts,Sungshin Women's University

MFA, Graduate School of Sungshin Women's University

Mailing Address

#100, Rose Tower Building, 784-5 Yeoksam-dong, Gangnam-gu, Seoul, Korea

Tel +82-2-5656600 / +82-10-4131-0071

Fax +82-2-5014233

Blog http://blog.naver.com/spskbyun

www.sook-kyung.com

Written by Kim, Jung Rak (Head of curator, Kim Chong Yung Sculpture Museum)