[Joseonhee's Frame] Capturing Time_Work Notes

What we capture in a photograph is not the object itself that we see. It is my thoughts and perspective looking at that object. It is love for that object. I sprayed pigment on a flower dried for 20 years. Then, it approached me not just as a dried flower but as something new with a different vitality. (Provided by JoaJoa Studio)

I have never decided to live minimally. I am inherently complicated, messy, sentimental, and unable to discard or cut off things, so I never even dream of such a thing. That’s why my surroundings are always filled with what others might see as useless items. It’s not that I collect them, but rather that I cannot throw them away.

Broken clocks, old dolls, even dolls with broken necks, masks collected from various countries, letters and postcards sent by someone, flowers imbued with someone’s feelings?all these hold time captive and fill my surroundings. Ten years, twenty years... some have held even more time, gazing at me. They look at me as if to evoke what Roland Barthes called 'that-has-been,' and for several years now, unable to endure their outcry, I have begun to capture them through photography, the essence of which is that-has-been.

It was around that time I started looking into withered flowers through the camera lens. It began with flowers gifted to me about 20 years ago. They were beautiful. But I hated how they withered and disappeared after being placed in a vase. It pained me that the giver’s feelings faded and the flowers were discarded. Instead of letting them wither and decay after reaching their peak life in water, I gathered the flowers that came to me and let them dry as they were, allowing them to exist beside me. I simply placed them in a vase without water, turning them into mummies. Losing moisture as their fate, they reproduced new forms, each trapping time within their unique shapes.

Intrigued by their new forms, I placed them one by one before the camera and spent years observing and pressing the shutter. Yet, they were just mummified flowers, objects with interesting shapes. I put the camera away again. Another year, two years passed. Just as I was moving studios and thinking of throwing them all away, a sudden realization struck me! They were no longer just flowers to me; they had become something new that had spent time with me and consciously formed a special relationship with me.

Ah, for over 20 years, I had only looked at their exteriors. I had forgotten what I always told my students for over 10 years in my own work.

'Photographers do not look at objects merely to reproduce them. The photographer’s thoughts and life must be infused within. What I photograph is precisely myself.'

I felt the need to bestow new beauty upon those who share a special relationship with me. Immersed in intense colors, I began to coat them with flashy fluorescent hues. Oh, what a surprise! Their essence changed. They transformed from flowers into 'something that traps time.' They made my heart race. Those flowers, which had just come and gone before my camera as withered flowers for years, began to feel lovable.

In fact, what we capture in photographs is not the object itself that we see. It is my thoughts and perspective as I look at that object. It is love for that object. The essence of photography, according to Roland Barthes’ theory, goes beyond that-has-been and approaches me as 'that-was-loved.'

Someone said that my work seems to breathe new life into the subjects. Indeed, by coloring those that had slowly lost vitality over thousands, tens of thousands of hours, creating new forms?once living beings whose life had already been exhausted?I tried to revive them.

I am drawn to old things. It must be because of lingering attachment or tenderness toward the years spent with me or someone else. Someone once said that if you accept all things that disappear, you won’t live stubbornly. But I accepted all things that disappear and became obsessed with their disappearance. Because they had entered me and my time.

They do not simply disappear; they reside within some relationship with me before vanishing. Perhaps if I do not throw them away, they might not disappear for longer than I will.

Cho Sunhee, Photographer / Professor, Department of Photography and Imaging, Kyungil University