MITSUO KIM

He is most known for his row series, in which the artist transfers a scene that he has photographed onto a paraffin surface through silk screening. He then melts parts of the paraffin wax using a burner to distort the image, which hardens and stabilises. This act of melting a completed picture, using a destructive technique like burning and melting makes the work vulnerable to uncontrollable outcomes. As the image blurs, so does the boundary between the support medium and the delineative ink. Kim explores such ambiguities like boundaries by fluctuating between the solid and the fluid, and between the formed and deformed.

This study on contradictions is also seen in the photographic images the artist uses in his work. Kim addresses position and perspective, examining where one stands and which side one takes, by using divisive objects and themes like “wire fences” and “walls.” For example, his work row-kanaami (wire fence) appears to be black and white shots taken from one side of a wire fence. However, through his distinctive method of melting and warping surface images, the fences – clear boundaries between the viewer and the depths of the artwork – become blurry, sides and positions become unclear; and the artworks become borderless. Kim’s work and method are revealing, especially since the artist recognises that there lies within him a wish to embrace contradictions and remain fluid, as well as a desire to establish a position and become stable.

Kim has won several awards including the VOCA Encouragement Prize (2014), the Art Award Tokyo Marunouchi 2012 French Embassy Prize, and the Asahi Shimbun Prize at the 2012 Kyoto Art Biennale.

Kim has held several solo exhibitions, including APERTO 01 KIM Mitsuo: White light White heat at the 21st Century Museum of Contemporary Art Kanazawa, Kanazawa, Japan (2014). His group exhibitions include VOCA 2014 ¬– The Vision of Contemporary Art 2014 at the Ueno Royal Museum, Tokyo, Japan; the 2012 Kyoto Art Biennale at the Museum of Kyoto, Japan; and the 11th Gunma Biennale for Young Artists 2012, the Museum of Modern Art Gunma, Takasaki, Japan. His work is part of the Machida City Museum of Graphic Arts in Tokyo and Montblanc Japan, among other public collections.

Text by Makiko Arima