Press Release

A Ten-Year Voyage CI KIM’s Solo Exhibition: SAILING

Untitled, 2013, mixed media, dimensions variable

Title | <SAILING> CI KIM’s Solo Exhibition

Date | July 18 (Thu) 2013 ~ Sep. 22 (Sun)

Location | Arario Gallery Cheonan

Works | Paintings, sculptures, installations, photography, etc.

Arario Gallery hosts CI KIM’s seventh solo exhibition <SAILING> at Arario Gallery Cheonan, starting

on July 18th.

Found in Jeju Island

This exhibition invites the viewers to three sailings, each with its own meaning.

This town is the home of migratory birds and a place of retreat for CI KIM, where he spends over half

a year.

CI KIM’s solo Exhibition <Sailing> presents paintings sculptures and installations he has prepared

over an hour’s walk from his Hadori studio to Seongsan Ilchulbong, repeating his daily routines. The

works consist of discarded objects he found on the beach nearby the studio, such as an abandoned

buoy, plastic or scrap metal pieces. A rusty fridge or sea-water drenched Styrofoam chunks are all

transformed into his self-portraits, the moment they don a pair of boots or glasses.

From objects that have served their use and are now defunct, CI KIM finds the traces of time, and

turns these materials still containing vestiges of their voyage into new art objects through his unique

perspective. Considering his status as a collector and businessman, the act of “collecting” may be

equally applied to random objects in Nature and to art works he has been compiling from all around

the world for over 30 years.

Death and Disaster

The traces of time and aging seen in objects found in Nature are the marks of death and attrition,

but also signature of unyielding desire for life. The artist is constantly aware of death and disaster.

He cuts up time into bits and pieces, capturing screen shots on the TV, or amplifying an

equestrian statue used as tomb furnishing. The canvas, with tomatoes rubbed on its rough surface,

is covered in mold – the bright colors and clear lines are all muddled and torn up, revealing its

visceral innards.

They allude to death, but also point towards new hope. CI KIM adds further weight to the tragedy

by depicting a sick boy and an adopted girl, a photo featured in The Times, but he also reminds

the viewers of a certain willfulness to overcome disaster through the phrase “AIDS is going to

lose.” To those who are out at sea, on a voyage, rough waters and the utter quietude that follows

are unexpected, unpredictable visitors. Death and disaster, beyond human comprehension or

prediction, are objects of fear and pain in themselves but they also signify the will and

perseverance of those who fight against fate.

A Dynamic Voyage

This exhibition also introduces representative works that show CI KIM’s past decade as an artist,

along with the pieces he produced in Jeju. As a businessman-turned artist, CI KIM tried to define,

understand and digest art in his own way, facing this new world of “art” as a new element in his life.

Simple and honest acts such as taking photographs, plucking, pasting, piercing, pouring paint, or

balancing comprised his attempted to experiment with different modes of expressions. The Rainbow

and Collage series from the 2000s fall under this category.

Since then, CI KIM experienced with new materials such as tomatoes and iron shavings, borrows

images used in mass media and transforms objects we find in our daily lives. The objects he collects

in his usual routines become portraits or form unique installations such as panels containing

messages or unfamiliar-looking combinations. In these experimental processes, CI KIM acquired his

own methodology, constantly staying aware of the basic elements of art such as the square frame of

the canvas as he had first encountered it years ago, colors, and balance.

The piece CI KIM has been focusing on lately is a solid color painting made of triangle-shaped

corrugated cardboard. He speaks of the concentration of force and its tension, and the order of space

found in the triangle. Pythagoras, a mathematician from Ancient Greece, had found that the perfect

balance and order of right-angled triangles come from the formula among the three squares

surrounding the right-angled triangle. CI KIM’s triangles are also born from one square. The triangles,

located in a space where the vertical and the horizontal meet, pull diffused forces together and

occupy the center of the space. They establish a tensile force within the given space through the

concentration of shapes and colors.

In short, to Ci KIM, his creative acts could be seen as a dynamic voyage, an act of “sailing” across the

vast expanse of water called art. The sense of comfort embedded in the word “Sailing” as a

paradoxical ring to it – perhaps not only because of the world’s prejudice against brave journeys into

unexplored grounds or self-propelled solitude and fear. This exhibition will be an opportunity for us to

see how CI KIM’s past and present form a consistent pattern, presenting prominent points in his

works and the creative processes among numerous pieces and series.

The exhibition takes place at Arario Gallery Cheonan from July 18 to September 22. Arario presents

an artist’s talk corner for the viewers during this period, and will publish a catalog entitled SAILING,

which shows CI KIM’s past works and activities.

CI KIM

Born in 1951

SOLO EXHIBITIONS

2013 SAILING, ARARIO Gallery, Cheonan, Korea

2011 Who Can Say What, ARARIO Gallery, Samcheong, Cheonan, Korea

2009 To Make a Rainbow, ARARIO Gallery, Cheonan, Korea

2007 Trauriger Tiger Toastet Tomaten, ARARIO Gallery, Cheonan, Korea

2005 extra seeing, ARARIO Gallery, Cheonan, Korea

2003 CI Kim, Union Project, London, U.K

Contemporary Art Continues, ARARIO Gallery, Cheonan, Korea

GROUP EXHIBITIONS

2010 Art in Superstar, Sungsan Arts Hall, Changwon, Korea

2009 Nongseong-dong Blues, Gwangju Museum of Art-Sangrok Gallery, Gwangju, Korea

Art in Superstar, Seoul Art Center, Seoul, Korea

2006 Ballkünster, Muesum der Bildenden Künste Leipzig, Leipzig, Germany

2004 Bug-Eyed; Art, culture and Insects, Redding, CA, U.S

2003 Art Bench, Yeouido Park, Seoul, Korea

MUSEUM COLLECTION

Muesum der Bildenden Kunste Leipzig, Leipzig, Germany

Daelim museum, Seoul, Korea

Images

Untitled, 2013, box, ladder and mixed media, dimensions variable

Untitled, 2013, mixed media, 190(h)x55x47cm

Untitled, 2010, used refrigerator, scull and mixed media, 143(h)x77x62cm scull 35(h)x18x18cm

error-24, 2011, C-print on diasec, 100x170cm each 20panels set (total 500x680cm)

Edgar Allen Poe 001, 2012, tomato, acrylic on canvas, 200x200cm

Edgar Allen Poe 002, 2012, tomato, acrylic on canvas, 200x200cm

Adoption, 2013, used refrigerator, neon and mixed media, dimensions variable

Aids is Going to Lose, 2013, tomato, charcoal, acrylic and mixed media on canvas, 250x200cm

Untitled, 2012, advertisement photo, acrylic on cardboard and canvas,

258x175cm each 5panels set

Untitled, 2012, acrylic on cardboard and canvas, 160x260cm

Untitled, Mixed media, 244x122cm each 6panels set

Untitled, 2013, drawing on paper, 21x16cm

Please direct further inquiries to:

Yeajin Song / Publicity (Seoul)

yeajinsong@arariogallery.com

+82 10 4403 0741 / + 82 2 541 5701

Image download:

Webhard: http://www.webhard.co.kr

ID: arariogallery / PW: arario

Download -> Ci KIM

www.arariogallery.com