Slade School of Fine Art Degree Showcase 2020 - BA/BFA

UCL

Haeji Min

The essential element of my artwork is the life and death of humans in mirroring the life cycle of plants. In my artwork, I create virtual plant characters to impose the narrative. The meaning of companionship, sentimentality, and representation of a caretaker is a positive connotation for plant life due to my reminiscent of a simple life in childhood. In contrast, the negative aspect of my plant depiction is the idea rooted in the forest demolition by humans. In attribution to the reminiscence of my childhood living in Canada and New Zealand, plants became my companion when I strolled down the grass track to get to my home. Similarly, nature provides a solace whenever I surround my body with plants in the botanic garden when I get stressed from studying or being homesick. This acts as a bridge for a utopia, where I can escape from real-life struggles and worries.Whereas the story I construct with the negative undertone of nature is the terror behind the dictatorial demolition by humans to natural life since we cannot detect the result of invisible effects and its impact on humans in the future. The plant to human metamorphic look in my painting generates by the plants mutated by nuclear and radiation accidents and incidents in Japan and from the Chernobyl disaster. This grotesque but beautiful description of the virtual characters marks the intensive presence with an undulated to controlled motion. Furthermore, this technical variation coincides with my interweaving theme of the paradoxical nirvana. In detail, you are in the perfect peaceful place such as heaven (nature), yet you are still unhappy. If I cannot find nirvana in my status quo, virtual reality invites me into their world. In other words, when nature undergoes some negative moments due to the cause of human manipulation, I create artwork to make a tribute to nature. The presence of the synthesis of human-nature in my imaginary world, and it signifies compromise, primarily an apologetic gesture of the arbitrary human dominance over nature. Plants transformed into human or vice versa is coming out from compassion; we feel the pain of suffering as much as the plants do. Consequently, my sympathy for the weak causes the opposition to the anthropocentric view on nature. All activities from the most mundane to academic research feed into my artwork. I have accumulated visual memories of travelling around the world, and this becomes a significant advantage of my intuitive flow of artmaking and open-minded vision to see the world and my surroundings. Next, the compilation of watching films (The Fall by Tarsem Singh, The Others by Alejandro Amenábar, and The Invasion by Oliver Hirschbiegel etc), and soaps, creative forms of buildings designed by Zaha Hadid (The Opus) in Dubai, cityscapes, lights, shadow, the tension between confronting a social situation, the muscle structure, and a ballet choreography are some examples of my immediate creative responses. Besides, the anatomic drawings of Leonardo Da Vinci and the medieval art such as The Ghent Altarpiece: The promise of the Annunciation are influential to my painting techniques due to admiring the perfect ratio and beauty. Greek sculpture inspired the depiction of realistic and masculine body parts to expose strong mimesis, meaning the imitation of the world, which maximizes the plausibility of real figures to beholders. In terms of the technicality of my drawing derived from the body horror films by David Lynch impacted the original grotesque images of body/organ integration with objects.

Instagram: @haejiminart

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The European Garden

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Haeji Min

, 2019, oil colour and oil pastel on canvas.

I communicate with the virtual characters. They are the representation of different aspects of my personality and vulnerability. When I, directly and indirectly, encounter a relatively more abhorrent event than my mundane life, fear and anxiety stimulate my creativity in producing meaningfully loaded artwork, rather than the sole expression of emotion. The reflection of my fragility portrays itself in my artwork as a profile of faces screaming and dashing away in a scattered manner. My fictional characters expressing this silent shriek represents my fear of speaking my genuine and innermost feelings and thoughts out loud. I find this release in artwork cathartic. Moreover, life and death coexist as figures roaming around the coffin to tribute someone from the dead.

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The Pirate Ship

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Haeji Min

, 2019, oil colour and oil pastel on canvas.

The depictions of imaginative distorted human figures integrated with geometrical elements and the narrative I hear around me become an anchor to create my artwork. I enjoy listening to a podcast when I paint. When I was listening to Episode 59: A Deep Fear from the American podcast called "Lore", I thought of painting a pirate ship. It was a folktale about sailors captured by the pirates in the inescapable ocean and peoples’ misperception of seeing the sea monster from the distance when it is just an odd shape of the island. These imaginary scenes in my mind developed and created the tortured sailors by the pirates, and they depicted as the blue sea monster/machine in this painting.

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My Multiple Egos

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Haeji Min

, 2019, oil colour and pen on canvas .

I made this painting about my father, indicated by the suit on the hanger. Additionally, the longing for my family is a feeling I hold when I paint this, so the gestural position of my body symbolizes my past. Thus, the egos emerging out from my body are the representation of my solitude, living alone in London. 
 There are no distinctive personalities to each ego represented in the painting. However, I'm aware of them generated by the uncertainty of my future and being homesick. Therefore, the search for comfort, indoor space and possessing house plants expressed through the setting of this painting and the connection to two of my egos sits in the bottom left corner.

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The Lone Man in the Botanic Garden

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Haeji Min

, 2019, ink on canvas.

I have seen a Spanish animated drama film called “Wrinkles”(Arrugas). The film was based in the nursing home where the protagonist attempts to escape from the institution after feeling void from living with some of his fellow mentally ill residents. The protagonist is isolated from his mundane life as living with his family and was longing for his youth. Hence, I recreated this isolation as the story of an elder person reading in the garden and chatting with plants that look like humans to draw.

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The Ominous Lab

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Haeji Min

, 2019, oil colour on canvas.

This painting describes the evolving technology from different fields, Nuclear power-plant, and human cloning in modern society. However, the fear of technological advancements grew on me when they affected my daily life. The nuclear power plant explosion in Fukushima, Japan (2012) occurred due to the lack of basic safety requirements, and the tsunami following the earthquake in 2011. This natural disaster and the malfunction of the technology gave a surge of anxiety to me because there could be radioactive fish or any debris where I live. (The nuclear power-plant explosion portrayed on the left bottom corner.) Alongside nuclear experimentations, the research of human cloning is in progress. Even the bountiful supply of cloned animals seems far in the distant future; there was a successful example of cloned sheep, Dolly (1996). In the painting, the man and the dog clone reproduced by the DNA from the scientists in the laboratory. According to these scientific events, this painting contains my anxiety about the uncertain side effects of technological development. Therefore, the dominant red indicates blood extracted for cloning and blue for the ocean that spreads the radioactive creatures worldwide.

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The Butcher's Fridge

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Haeji Min

, 2020, oil colour on canvas.

I often imagine the lives of chickens at a local butcher shop. The question I have is, is it acceptable to presume there is nothing extraordinary against their butchery because their purpose was to serve by becoming a consumption of our dinner table? What if they also had emotions similar to humans, hence is it safe to normalize the slaughter because they consent in silence?  I’m neither vegetarian nor a hater of meat-eaters, but most times I consume meat, it is inevitable not to raise numerous questions about the meaning of socially acceptable behavior. Although contemporary society becomes highly matured in performing within the socially legal boundary, it is essential to question our actions before making any assumptions.

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Far From Home

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Haeji Min

, 2020, oil colour on canvas.

My artwork is the reflection of my status quo, and by creating metaphorical characters, I feel the alleviation of my current worries. This idea originates from my struggles I fight against in London. Living abroad has countless advantages, particularly helpful for the development of independence and maturity at multiple levels. Whereas living with no family in a foreign country, at that time, the benefits cannot suffice my yearn to go back home. In ordinary days, I have goals to achieve and schedules to fulfil that would not allow any unnecessary thoughts. However, coming back to an empty house after an intensive day made my mind weaker as time passed. The only exit to the ephemeral hell at that instance was to rely on the imaginary world where I stay with my loved one, and the painting represents it by lovers merged into a beautiful sculpture.

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The Shadow of Radish Man

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Haeji Min

, 2020, oil colour on canvas.

Generally, conscious thinking accompanies skepticism, which is against habitual routines. Having doubts is unveiling the dark trail of thoughts that potentially brings solitude in terms of being uncomfortably outstanding and contradicts the traditional senses. Nevertheless, a skeptical approach is a search for identity and a symbol of growth. I believe this infinite oscillating exploration happens to every breathing creature. Presumably, plants go through the same level of struggles as humans do, battling to survive in the wild world, feeling jealous or competitive toward the surrounding plants to obtain sufficient nutrients from the soil. Thus, the painting denotes the conflicts of growth in each individual, including all species on earth and the universe. The two depictions of the presence and absence of gravity is an example of this. Within these two types of settings, the characters exude an aura that they each have their own stories, and whatever that story may be, they contain a gesture that it is a personal reason to not share with others. In the painting, they acquired their solution to cope with the growing pains by aimlessly floating around the space, staying silent to focus on whatever is in front of them, and blaming others for their dismay.

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Four Dancers on the Stage

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Haeji Min

, 2019, oil colour on canvas.

This painting indicates the constant pressure of meeting social standards in daily lives. In some professions such as dancer, success is earned by determined efforts of fighting against eating low-calorie foods and maintaining the dancer shape. Thus, in my painting, I capture the emotion of a dancer sneakily devouring an ice cream with her unsettling facial expression. Also, the narrative about the lacking free time depicts through the crucified ballerina intertwined with the stage lights and this crucifixion to a success-oriented mindset prohibits people from finding joys on other occasions.

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The Mermaid Experiment

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Haeji Min

, 2019, gouache on canvas.

I created a virtual mermaid character to denote the unequal benefits given to an executor in contrast to the profits of a receiver. The executor and receiver relationship interpretation might vary in different social contexts, but I focus on the moral justification issue of brutal and arbitrary human activities (research) to some animals. The Mermaid Experiment metaphorically suggests the brutal operation from researchers. It depicts the fear of being a subject of experimentation and reveals the genetic modification process of a mermaid. Hence, the researchers (top of the painting) being indifferent to the painfully sobbing mermaid and its fetus shows the emotional distinction between the subject and the executor.

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The Suffocation From My Small Dormitory

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Haeji Min

, 2018, acrylic paint and magazine collage.

The Suffocation from my Small Dormitory generates from my real-life experience of living in a small student residence in Chicago. I enjoyed the Fine Art courses I participated in Chicago (SAIC) as an exchange student from London, whereas my room next to the train track disturbed my sleep and caused me to insomnia. The experience of ominous dreams and the colours of city lights, railway noise, and vibration inspired me to produce this painting.

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The Mind Operator

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Haeji Min

, 2019, pen on paper.

The drawing of the mind operator contains my anxiety about the unveiled side effects of technological development. Hence, the projection of human dominance over machine juxtaposes with the humanized machines is a possible result of our mechanized world particularly by the control of our mobile phone. My self- reflective yet as toughly structured as a machine-like drawing illustrates by pen restricted with a few colour palette to suggest the unification of our both positive and negative thoughts injected from the virtual world.

Curriculum Vitae

Education

2017-2020
Slade School of Fine Art, UCL (First Class Honours)
BFA Fine Art

Prizes, scholarships or awards

June 2020
Shortlisted for the Ashurst Emerging Artist Prize 2020 (Top 30)

March 2020
Shortlisted for European Biennial of Contemporary Art (May - June 2020)

January 2020
Shortlisted for The Social Art Award- Can Art Catalyze Change?

July 2019
Winning the Herbert Seaborn Memorial Scholarship Prize
added to the Higher Education Achievement Report (HEAR)

September 2018
Winning the Jackson Lewis scholarship
The Scholarships are awarded on the recommendation of the appropriate faculty.

July 2018
Rome Art Programme Scholarship, Italy

October 2014
The First Korean University Art Competition Special Prize

Exhibitions

Ashurst Emerging Artist Prize 2020 Shortlist group exhibition
Ashurst, Fruit & Wool Exchange, 1 Duval Square, London, E1 6PW
29 June - 25 September 2020

Biennale Européenne d’Art Contemporain 2020
Galerie Daniel Vignal,81330 Vabre, France
May - June 2020

Price List

1.
The European Garden
2019
oil colour and oil pastel on canvas
220 x 170 cm
Price on Request

2.
The Pirate Ship
2019
oil colour and oil pastel on canvas
200 x 260cm
Price on Request

3.
My Multiple Egos
2019
oil colour on canvas
250 x 220cm
Price on Request

4.
The Lone Man in the Botanic Garden
2019
ink on canvas
350 x 120cm
Price on Request

5.
The Ominous Lab
2019
oil colour on canvas
160 x 190cm
Price on Request

6.
The Butcher’s Fridge
2020
oil colour on canvas
190 x 160cm
Price on Request

7.
Far From Home
2020
oil colour on canvas
190 x 190cm
Price on Request

8.
The Shadow of Radish Man
2020
oil colour on canvas
290 x 160cm
Price on Request

9.
Four Dancers on the Stage
2019
oil colour on canvas
160 x 190cm
Price on Request

10.
The Mermaid Experiment
2018
gouache on canvas
110 x 340cm
Price on Request

11.
The Suffocation from my Small Dormitory
2018
acrylic and magazine collage on canvas
200 x 400cm
Price on Request

12.
The Mind Operator
2019
pen on paper
29.7 x 42.0cm
Price on Request

For all sales enquiries, please contact the artist directly.

All works are unframed, unless otherwise stated, and prices shown do not include postage and packaging.

NB: The Slade School of Fine Art does not act as an intermediary for sales, nor is it liable for any disputes arising from sales of artworks.