Foyers (Hearths)

You have never been there and you will never go, but you know this place although it does not exist. Contradictory, yes and no. In her recent works, Yoo Hye-Sook suggests a space, a location she knows without knowing it, a place that isn’t one, but provokes a reaction. For her, it’s about the exploration of an indefinite, born from the simple pleasure of hearing and seeing the pencil go over the canvas. A space, resulting from the meeting of matters : first the artist lays matte black acrylic backgrounds on which thousands of graphite lines reveal surfaces on the surface that little by little become perspectives that create a place: a wall, an opening, what one discerns as a room, an anonymous angle. But soon, this vision reverts into a nameless abstract geometric composition as the surrounding light interacts with the artwork all the time playing tricks on perception ; a vision appears and then morphs. The shiny graphite matter captures and reverberates light while creating the luminosity that allows the geometric shapes to “emerge” from the black surface.

Through these artworks which seem minimalist and almost inscrutable, Yoo Hye-Sook manages to awaken more primary registers, activate our senses, while offering a foray towards an elsewhere. A respite and a reminder.