김형욱(Hyungwook Kim)

1976년10월05일 출생

서울에서 활동

작가 프로필 이미지

소개말

Photography and Me

The media of photograph has a characteristic covering both the subjectivity reflecting artist’s creative interpretation and the objectivity showing others a visual reality. The photography, as a genre of art, requires not only a consciousness and sensitivity which are basic requirements for a good artist to express a subject but also technological endeavors. Therefore, the photography enables us to actively seek a creative solution and this can be a big merit of the photography. Furthermore, the endless development of cutting-edge technologies may strengthen the potential of the photography as a genre of art.

Photography action (a sequence from conceiving a work to achieving outcomes) carries a life from the very start of conceiving. My endeavors to transform the subject I noticed in the still and flat image into a three-dimensional topic are nothing less than those of a passionate painter. Although the imagery outcome comes to an end as its lifespan expires, it remains in someone’s record and continues its existence as long as our civilization goes on.

I capture an image at a very short moment. However the image contains my story telling about invisible concept, eternal truth and precious value we should keep forever. How charming it is to be remembered by somebody else by creating such stories!

The turning point that my eye got open to the attractiveness of photography dates back to the days of my study abroad when I let the photography soothe my nostalgia for home. In Japan where I stayed to study comics, I discovered my sensitivity which I had not known until then and finally realized that the photography is an expression media suitable to that sensitivity of mine. After my return to Korea, as I got acquainted and interacted with many artists having various characters and being active in various genres, I started my professional work activity. Since then, I have grown into a photographer with a reputation for building a world of lyric art work combining both oriental and western sensitivities.



Objet and Space


One day I felt that a chair abandoned in front of my house was like the most solitary life. Since then, the chair became me and the chair in photographs breathed a new life into each of my stories.

The objet left behind in a desolate space is a source of my boundless imagination. It may seem a most tragic scene which we may stare at the very last moment of our lives. However, from a different angle, it may be a time and space where anxiety and expectation surging at the starting line on which we commence something, solitude and liberty, consciousness and desires for existence and confusion mingle together. The chair in my photo is something more than an image of a tool artificially created to serve for authority and convenience of humans. It is the least cozy space where we seek continuous questions and answers about existence. It takes the role of a speaker who speaks for me and all of us who are bold to prepare for a new beginning.

I go on journeys through the world to the places of photographing where only the subject seems outstanding disregarding races, countries, eras, religions etc. In short journeys, I move from a topic to another topic getting a new inspiration and it resembles a series of fundamental subjects I try to put into my work. Work activity is a kind of blessings to me as it releases me from struggling at a small desk.



Main Theme


The main theme is a story about a journey seeking endless questions and answers about every existence and its eventual value.

No matter what it is, whether it is visible or not, anything existing has the destiny to be born and to die repeating a progress and a return to the starting point. It may be a physical world dominating us, an intangible spiritual world, a temporal concept such as the past and the future or the course itself going forward to eventual substance. By just having pure questions about it, we may take a big step forward to the precious value, look back ourselves with a cool head and finally stand at the starting line of the journey which may be long or short and is to understand all the stories covering our neighbor and the entire world. My world of art work is to discover important concepts and stories in various areas at the very starting line while hanging over between subjective view and objective view.

The big main stream running through all the works and the objet, a chair, seem like strong liveliness and willingness springing out from the bottom of solitude and a leader (leading his own life and) preparing for a new era.

The stories are about the people who show a sense of presence to the world rediscovering themselves doing self-training in their own fields and introspection or the people who have a dream to become like that. These people are ourselves who dream a bigger dream feeling pleasant heart beatings even though being anguished and anxious at the moments for numerous decisions and choices we face from time to time in the course of our lives.



Theme colour


The four colors usually appearing in my works i.e., white, blue, red and black symbolize changes and persistence of every existence and its value. I felt that the four colors clearly represent the course of a life including birth, growth and extinction. Thereafter, I have received persistent and special inspirations. Especially, the black in my work means neither the latter stage of a life close to death nor an unknown gloomy and dreadful place but a new dimensional gate connecting to another world, a micro cosmos conceiving a new life and a fresh start to go back to pure and innocent days. (Ridiculously, it took long time for me to realize that these four colors were major ones for the national flag of my home country)