HYUNSOO LEE

This exhibition showcases the artist’s continued exploration of his father, focusing on the physical deterioration of Jong Man Lee and the complex emotions between father and son. The new works address the inevitability of ageing, exploring themes of vulnerability, memory, and the passage of time through humour, colour, and personal reflection. The title Jong Man Ri is a playful wordplay on his father’s name. The word ‘Ri’ is used as in Korean place names, not as his father’s surname ‘Lee’ in English, evoking a sense of isolation and symbolising his father’s separation from society and the decline of his later life. By twisting his father’s name for the exhibition title, Lee hopes to provoke curiosity and laughter, conveying his intention to present the subject not as a purely serious matter.

Hyunsoo Lee (b. 1981) received his B.F.A from Seoul National University of Science and Technology in Seoul in 2009, and his M.F.A from Korea National University of Arts in Seoul in 2015. In 2017, he completed an M.F.A program at the School of Visual Arts in New York. Lee enjoys a kind of ‘play’ that expands into various forms, such as three-dimensional art, installation, performance, and collaboration, depending on the given space and time. He reinterprets the characteristics of drawing and establishes his own principles of form. The artist wishes that art were a common joke and views drawing as a visual language, striving to convey linguistic play through it.

Major solo exhibitions include; EVERGREEN, SeMA Storage, Seoul, (2021), Playing Drawing: after drawing, Post Territory Ujeongguk, Seoul, (2018), and Playing Drawing: before drawing, Seogyo Art Experiment Center, Seoul (2018). In ad, the artist was a resident artist at the Cheongju Art Studio in 2019 (13th session), a recipient of the Seoul Museum of Art’s Emerging Artist program in 2021, a resident at the Incheon Art Platform in 2022 (13th session), and a resident artist at the SeMA Nanji Art Studio in 2023 (17th session).