Curation: Transmute (2015)

Curator Isaac Kim
10/19 – 10/31/2015
Pratt Institute Steuben Gallery
200 Willoughby Ave, Brooklyn, NY, 11205

: to change the form, appearance, or nature of (someone or something)

Curator Isaac Kim and co-curator Alexandra Price curate “Transmute” to be held at Pratt Institute’s Steuben Gallery between the dates of October 19th and 31st. The goal of the show is to communicate to the viewer that there is more to mentality and physicality than what’s visible to the human eyes or what can be imagined through what we already know by offering different viewpoints or imagery about the human mind and physical being. Artists participating in the show are Hannah Berry, Garrett Hobba, Isaac Kim, So Yoon Kim, Alana MacDougall, Djavan Nascimento, Allison Yano, Jiang Ye, and Soo Yun.

Hannah Berry
8 x 11 inches each
Intaglio and chine colle

In this work I am questioning preconceptions of the body. I am interested in how we are compelled to disguise our natural image with a fabricated facade of clothing, and how we commonly define ourselves and others through the clothing worn, whether by choice or societal pressures.

Garrett Hobba
The Man Who Heals Himself
22 x 27 inches

The thing happens (whichever thing you’ve striving to achieve) when you realize the futility of trying to make it happen. All you are is part of the process. Experimentation, artistic creation is an unfolding, and intuitive letting go of self, and act of embracing emptiness. After the fact, after one stops to reflect on what has happened, and looks at the record of the unfolding, then there might be a surprise, as if an inner face has revealed itself, something long lost or forgotten, from another world. That is the unknown making itself known, an assurance that we’re not alone in this baffling existence.

Isaac Kim
42 x 96 inches
Pen on BFK Rives

I take the turbulent natural phenomenon of the maelstrom and turn it into a repetitive labor intensive mark-making process to visually explore the randomness and shapelessness of mental states.  The textural and topographic otherworldly atmospheres that arise from the parallel between imagery and process prompt viewers to interpret the dreamscape through their own cognitive construct. Recently I have been utilizing patterns that arise from the different ways I hold my media and move my arms, with which I have been experimenting with in creating deliberate fusions of physiology, psychology, and nature.

So Yoon Kim
42 x 54 inches
Oil on canvas

The uncanny nature of memory recollection is embodied in my work through the dismemberment of the human figure and placing the fragments in a non-figurative environment. My work extends beyond a specific narrative to represent collective experiences of the human psyche. By doing so, what was subconscious becomes conscious without the clarity.

Alana MacDougall
Tension Ladder
Variable dimensions
Ceramic, rope, and hardware

Drawing on my own experiences with the medical system, my sculptures discuss the fragility and vulnerability of the human body. The intersection of organic and industrial materials speak to medical intervention – an invading and manipulation of the body by something foreign. Invented systems are pulled taut and threaten the organic forms they suspend.

Djavan Nascimento
Blue Light Yellow Light I
22 x 30 inches

My work deals abstractly with issues of light, space, and color. I work in silkscreen, using a process where elements of chance and loss of control leave their traces in the imagery. I am interested in dualities like Present vs absent, geometry vs gesture, present vs past, and treading in the ambiguous spaces where opposing forces meet.

Allison Yano
The Greeter
37 x 50 inches
Colored pencil, acrylic paint, mylar, acetate, and collage on paper

I am interested in hybridity and ambiguity as defined through three specific relationships: multiracial and multicultural encounters; analog and digital mediums; and historic and futuristic imagery. Drawing inspiration from the overlapping areas between these connections, I seek to portray a fantastical past-future on the brink of emergence, or that is vanishing amidst a sea of visual information.

Jiang Ye
Balloons #1
36 x 36 inches
Oil on canvas

I am always interested in different objects. They have multiple meanings and never tell lies. When I paint objects, I don’t want to show the specific images of them. What I want is to convey the strongest sense of it. So always they look familiar but also really like something else. Between the feelings of obvious and uncertain, audiences can participate into the thinking of the objects and feel the strong sense of them.

Soo Yun
A Perverted Story #2
39.4 x 16.1 x 19.7 inches
Epoxy, animal toys, dolls, and acrylic colors

A Perverted Story #3
4.7 x 5.3 x 5.1 inches
Epoxy, toys, and acrylic colors

I try to reel off narratives with my imagination relating the sense of deficiency from farewell, oppression, and abandonment. I destroy and recreate some symbolic objects regarding the childhood. This behavior implies not merely a fun, but hints the complex boundary related to violence, human’s perverted ecstasy, brutal daydreaming, indoctrinated morality and education, and the duality of human nature.