SHIN MINJOO

Shin Minjoo has been consistently exploring the essence of painting based on the fundamental artistic gesture of brush stroke. Various experiences from the artist’s life have internally accumulated within herself as certain images, and these images are visually revealed on the surface of the canvas through intense brush strokes. The work of Shin Minjoo is produced from the repetitive process of brisk brush strokes on large canvas then pushing out the paints built on the surface with a squeegee, a printmaking tool used for silkscreen, which ultimately creates a compelling screen full of painterly qualities encountered by great tension and powerful energy.

For the works in this exhibition, Shin not only used black and white, the colours she has mainly focused on using for her paintings, but also used chromatic colours on the background of the paintings to create a vivid contrast between the black and white brush strokes on the foreground. This contrast is an expression of the artist’s mixed emotions that are often paradoxical and immanent within the artist, as well as a representation of the artist’s enlightenment on how the conditions of the incompatible beings, such as light and shadow, coexist in this world.

Shin completed her BFA and MFA in Painting at Hongik University, and has participated in numerous solo and group exhibitions at many renowned art museums and galleries including Ilmin Museum of Art, Kumho Museum of Art, Hanwon Museum of Art, KwanHoon Gallery and Gallery Lux. Shin’s solo exhibition at PKM Gallery is the artist’s second solo show at the gallery since her last show from three years ago in 2015.