Yeo Hyun Kwon

Over the span of nearly four decades, Kwon, who has seldom laid down his brush, has embarked on a multifaceted artistic journey, consistently delving into the profound exploration of the essence of painting. He began his work in the late '80s with fundamental questions about self, personal and societal memory, and human existence. His early to mid-90s works primarily used thick textures and toned-down colors, focusing on themes like multiple ego-images, childhood memories, family, and archetypical memories with motifs like water mill stones and funnels. The internal exploration of human identity, prominent in Kwon's work until the '90s, expanded in the 2000s to address societal and psychological aspects of human existence. From this period, mythological imagery began to emerge alongside primal forests, and Kwon started incorporating postmodern philosophical theories, sociology, and psychology into his paintings enhancing the fundamental exploration of self and existence with transcendental imagination.

Particularly since the 2000s, Kwon's works have been characterized by a plethora of hybrid images from different times and spaces, unclassifiable by simple correlations. His approach of juxtaposing disparate situations, images, and concepts define his early works. With 'myth' and 'philosophy' as the key themes, the artist demonstrated a remarkable formal and thematic shift, especially evident in his Deviators series since 2020. These works, characterized by swift brush techniques and mastery over paint properties, depict contemporary Deviators and myth today, combining modern memes, hippie and hard rock culture of the 60s and 70s, characters from past and contemporary films with mythological images, forests, and philosophical themes. The images represent a fusion of past, present, future, and the blur between virtual and real.