<Dot>
"A Point is that which has no Parts or Magnitude."
-Euclid
A 'point', which exists but has nothing, has no way to visually express its existence. This is because no matter how fine a tool is, the moment it is drawn with a material, it becomes a 'plane with parts'. Therefore, a point drawn in my drawing is merely representation of the point, not a real point. Since it has no size, no direction, and no movement, a point is a 'void', and only open possibilities exist. Since it exists in the state of 'None', it became a self-contained being, but there is no way to prove by itself. Only its traces can be inferred as coordinate values. The representation of points has a shape of dots in my drawing. So, I draw dots on the grid. The grid, a rectangle or a circle drawn on paper, can be understood as a window frame toward the world. It is the only area that I can draw my dots, and that all the possibilities can come true.
I repeat dots till the grid is filled. Thousands of dots. By repeating the 'representation of dots', the meaning of the point I intended to convey evaporates, leaving only the amount of my labor to complete a piece of work. In this way, my dots reach the status of 'void' ironically. The viewers indulge only the artist's labor, forgetting the metaphor of the dots.
<Day>
A day is the amount of time that takes for the earth, which orbits around the sun, to revolve itself. A day is divided into twenty-four pieces, and each piece is further divided into sixty smaller pieces. These fragmented times are intertwined and connected again to make a day of life. Days repeat. As long as the sun does not lose its light, as long as the earth does not give up its rotation, days will repeat forever. We, however, meet the end of the day before we even finish to put all the fragments of time together. A day is always incomplete, leaving frustration and fatigue.
What if the sun sets, but the day still goes on until all the pieces of time are put together. Wouldn't it make my day wonderful? If I could define the boundaries of days like this, wouldn't I be able to confess on my last day that my life was fulfilled? Even before God created the sun and the earth, a 'day' existed. When God completed the work he had planned and rested, He called it a day. I thought it would be nice if my day was like that. So I started to call 'a day' when a drawing is finished. The drawing series that started with 'Day One' has now reached 'Day Sixty'. I have lived sixty days so far. I don't know how many more days I can live. I embrace all joy, sorrow, and pain within the boundaries of the day I drew. So, every day I draw is a perfect day, and they are all identical in a way.
<Counting>
As an introvert and timid girl, I was also slow to make friends. During my lunch breaks, I would go out to the playground and draw a small circle in the corner. Then, I sat down inside the circle and watched my friends running and playing. It was a safe place, and it was my own space. What did I do in that small space separated from the world? I can't remember because I was too young, but I think I might have drawn something on the ground, or collected tiny pebbles to make shapes. I got bored, and started counting. There was no clock, and I was too young to estimate the amount of time empirically. Wondering how many numbers I had to count until the bell rang, I played the counting games.
Counting was a waiting and fluttering moment for me as a child. I punctiliously counted the number of nights left for my birthday. My mother used to scold me for counting grains of rice, but in fact, I counted spoons, three more spoons to be dismissed. While waiting for mom back home, I played counting games all day alone. As I counted, my mother was sure to return. It was a small number, but sometimes a very big number for a young child to count.
I start my drawing with border lines of a rectangle or a circle on a blank paper. And fill it with countless dots. The border line drawn with a hard pencil separates me from the world. It is my personal space, and it is also the window I made towards the world. Of course, I didn't think about the childhood experience when I started this body of work. It was rather recently that the small circle on the playground and the counting games suddenly came into my mind. I only draw dots within the borders. That is the only place where 'I' am allowed. However, when I draw with pencils for days, the pencil dust blows away and settles down outside the boundary. And as my hands pass by while drawing, they leave traces. As if the wishful minds, sitting alone in a small circle and waiting for my friends to call me by name, were blown out of boundary... And as if the unexpected childhood memories dust down on my drawings.
<Time>
I am interested in the exploration of drawings as a medium for recording. I record in order to learn about myself and the drawings are a result of the investigation of my life as a woman and immigrant who plays a unique role in this society. One’s life, of a mortal being, inevitably goes with time. Examining my time in both quality and quantity allows me to understand who I am and what I am. I record the quantity of time that I spend to find the meanings of my life. The quality of my time is revealed in my repetitive marks, written words, and symbolic images. Quality of time and quantity of time are inseparable. They are intertwined in my drawings, even though one is seemingly more emphasized than the other in each drawing.
1. Quality of time
Time is condensed, especially to a woman, who has the multiple roles: a mother, a wife, an artist, an educator, and a member of the community. In the density of time, I look for meaning. Words that are never spoken loudly, emotions that are never expressed clearly, and desires that are never satisfied, are found there and transformed into images, texts and marks on the paper. I draw them obsessively, sometimes with very thin frail lines, and other times with bold letters. In the midst of time, I, as an immigrant, also look for home. Time transforms the space into place where I finally feel belonged. My drawing series ‘I am here’ and the sculpture series ‘Wingless birds’ investigate the common feelings of immigrants, such as the desperation of being forgotten/denied and the fear of isolation.
2. Quantity of time
I log the quantity of time in the drawing. Life is sustained only for a limited period of time. My interest is to record this kind of time, life-ridden but limited. In a daily life, time is segmented. Each segmentation has a different length. What I do, what I think, and what I feel are replaced with the empty-minded length of marks, in the same way as the landscapes are transformed to repeated pencil lines in the Agnes Martin’s drawings. I begin with a dot(a line), and repeat dots(lines). A dot(A line), drawn with dark graphite or red paint, marks a ‘moment’ on the paper. By repeating dots(lines), the moments grow into an ‘occasion’. The occasion, accumulation of moments, is finally reborn as a metaphorical entity. The impulse for tracing, recording, and marking moments is inescapable.
So I draw.