[Gallery Walk] 'Text' Reinterpreted with Fairy Tale Imagination

Arte K Um Ha-Young Solo Exhibition 'My Little'
K Auction Subsidiary Launches Full-Scale Artist Marketing

An exhibition by artist Eum Ha-young, who collects texts from various media such as pouring spam emails, politicians' remarks in the news, and lines from childhood favorite animations, and transforms them into her own messages, is being held.

Bigger Landscape 2023-2024 Acrylic, crayon, color pencil on canvas 162 x 130cm
[Photo by Arte K]

Arte K, a subsidiary of K Auction, an art auction company, is holding Eum Ha-young's solo exhibition "My Little" until Tuesday, March 12. In this first collaboration with Arte K, the artist presents a total of 20 paintings, including her representative work "BiggerLandscape," which reinterprets images and messages presented by the media with her own fairy-tale imagination.

Eum Ha-young questions the hidden ideology in the media that constantly pours messages in modern society and the stereotypes held by contemporary people that arise from it. She also questions our imagination, which is limited by the indiscriminate messages presented by the media, and seeks to find the essential meaning by escaping from this influence.

Eum Ha-young majored in Textile Art and Fashion Design at Hongik University and studied printmaking at the graduate school of the same university. She began working as a fashion illustrator at Vogue Korea in 2006, and was the first Korean to sign exclusively with the UK’s Lemonade Illustration Air Exhibition, carrying out global projects. Since 2012, she has expanded beyond illustration to work as an art artist and continues to actively create works to this day.

The keywords representing the artist’s work are text and Peter Pan. The works feature in-text, meaning "meaning written in words." Representative works include circular sculptural elements, stars, and horses inspired by the Disney animation "Peter Pan." At the bottom, the text "MUCHBIGGER &" is written, which is collected from parts of politicians' remarks reported in the news. In this way, the artist’s intention is to question our stereotypes that try to connect and interpret unrelated images and texts randomly arranged.

The reason why she included the text CRANKY in her work is also interesting. It cleverly expresses the dilemma that the artist cannot stick only to the work she wants but must reflect the audience’s needs and trends in her work.

Eum Ha-young Find Fairies_2022 [Photo by Arte K]

The artist repeats the process of removing existing images and leaving or overpainting certain parts, during which translucent layers of paint remain and traces of brush and hand are slightly revealed. This is an expression method devised by the artist to express the freedom of a child who is not yet bound by concepts and rules. In this way, the artist presents a fresh perspective to the audience with fairy-tale imagination and free expression, opening up space for various interpretations.

This exhibition can be viewed until March 12 on the first and second floors of the Arte K exhibition hall in Sinsa-dong, Gangnam-gu, Seoul. When purchasing works, a catalog and a print handcrafted by the artist will be given together. The catalog and prints are also available for separate purchase.

Arte K was established on September 1, 2021, as a 100% subsidiary of K Auction. It was launched to discover and support noteworthy artists and connect them with collectors, attracting attention in the art world as an auction company that directly discovers and introduces artists.

An Arte K official stated, "We will continue to discover and introduce artists with solid skills and potential who will lead the domestic art market. We plan to provide opportunities for artists to showcase their works and offer collectors the chance to access a diverse spectrum of works, lowering the threshold for owning artworks and further expanding the trend of expressing one’s own taste and personality through art."