Seon is a South Korean artist who transforms everyday experiences into art. Having lived abroad for decades, She has a diverse multicultural background: she studied in Japan in the 1990s before continuing her education in London. After a few years working in graphic design in the UK, her family moved to Singapore. She now lives in France, where she has been based for the past decade. This shifting patchwork of countries and cultures triggered an identity crisis in Seon: caught between her Asian roots and her European way of life, she became interested in the psychology of art, which led her to pursue a Master's degree in Art Therapy. After completing her studies, her clinical experience in art therapy led her to become an artist. During the healing process, she experienced spontaneous, self-expressive and symbolic communication that allowed her to resolve inner conflicts non-invasively. "Art is the highest form of self-expression," said Nietzsche, Seon’s identity crisis is transformed into an affirmation of her creativity, where she discovers her true self through reflection and compassion on his childhood experiences.
Seon's artistic philosophy is to embrace the range of emotions that arise within us and to have a positive outlook on life. She believes that the best experiences in life are those that allow us to gain important insights during difficult times, and Seon is sure that we all have had such experiences at one time or another. Even though it may not always be a positive experience, we should not lose the attitude of an observer toward our life even when life continues to be full of twists and turns. It‘s easy to get caught up in the realities of everyday life and forget the true meaning of these experiences. Seon explores how we can use the insights and perceptions gained from the various experiences we hold in our memories as a source of constant renewal.
Freud's instinctual impulses and Jung's self-actualisation have had a strong influence on her work. Seon's art is inspired by hidden memories from her childhood. Through a variety of mediums, including both ceramics and photography, she reflects on her life experiences and explores long-buried emotions, expressing the process of change and maturation over time. Ceramic is a medium of forgiveness and acceptance, which also enables an effective internal healing process. Seon uses ceramics as a medium to mirror her childhood experiences and feelings in her artwork. Ceramics are fragile and difficult to manage before the firing, just like a child. After the firing, however, ceramics become strong, and this reflects Seon's life journey. Photography reflects Seon’s inner world. In order to reflect the motivation found in Seon's past memories, she departs from traditional photographic techniques and uses semi-abstract pictorial expressions and semi-compositional colours and forms to express her inner reflections in a 'middle way'. The technique of expressing through half-form and half-representation is a reflection of Seon’s identity and philosophy. It is Seon's intention to overcome dichotomous thinking and discover what the true self is and what true freedom is.
At the heart of her work is Khong-Shiru, a traditional Korean pot used to germinate soybeans. Shiru has long been a part of Korean culture and embodies the simple sensibility and spirit of the Korean people. In her childhood, Seon saw small yellow soybeans growing in the darkness of the humid khong-shiru. The dark space in these pots creates an environment for the beans to sprout and thrive, embracing their growth as they struggle, twist and tangle with each other. Seon believes that this process, like human life, represents the experience of growing through struggle. The final stages of their growth are magical: they emerge tall and proud, yellow as sunlight. This light gave Seon a feeling of maternal warmth and guided her through her childhood loneliness; just looking at Shiru made her feel at home. For Seon, Shiru became a medium for creating light. Years later, she returned to this Shiru as a symbol of her emotional healing with her childhood in Korea through their physical manifestation in her ceramic works.
The Colours of Hidden Memories series is an expression of self-reflective 'conformity' through colour. For her, colour is the language of emotion and the medium through which she embodies the structural form of her works and the symbolism inherent in them. The combination of colour in traditional Korean thought with the visual expression of the semi-pictorial technique reflects Seon's desire for a balanced and unified inner world. She believes that a unified inner world leads to self-discovery and helps us to understand ourselves in depth, because the more we observe ourselves, the more we can discover our true self. The five colours - white, yellow, red, blue and black - symbolise the five elements of emotions: happiness, anger, sadness and joy, according to the Eastern concept of the Five Elements. These five colours not only represent the five elements and are the traditional colours of Korea, but also have a variety of meanings. For example, traditional Korean thought believes that the world is sustained by a balanced integration of the elements of yin and yang and the five elements, so it follows the laws of the universe and seeks harmony with nature. The colours in the middle of the spectrum represent yin, one of the five elements of the Eastern yin-yang system, based on the correlation of the five elements. Yellow represents peace and growth, green represents fertility and abundance, purple represents nobility and dignity, red represents joy, pleasure, and gentleness, and light blue represents ideals and hope. Seon cultivates the power of a contemplative mind, an inner artistic worldview that seeks to approach herself with compassion and understanding while maintaining a certain distance. Seon deeply reflects on the fact that nothing is one-dimensional, nothing is as full as empty, and nothing is as present as non-existent.
