‘My work begins with the question: “What is the basis of all beings?’
Artist: 우미란 / Woo Mi Ran
Artistic style: Art informed by ideas and developed in perceptual psychology
Biggest artistic influence: Park Hyun-Ki, Adrian Ghenie and Ai Weiwei.
Studio: Daegu
Woo Mi Ran’s paintings use a variety of materials and the works she produces visualise what human beings recognise. The theme behind Woo’s work, which she refers to as ‘basis’, is an important part of her art — it being the way she is able to question the basis of all existence. ‘I think,’ Woo says, ‘that making artwork is the same as creating my own language and expressing myself,’ something which she found interesting to explore at the start of her career.
Mostly, Woo’s preferred medium for art is to paint, but she also makes installations, media and on occasions, even performs. Whilst Woo is primarily located in Daegu (the South East of Korea), she does not consider herself to be restricted by location, and regularly exhibits her work in Seoul and Gumi – both in galleries and alternative spaces. Recently, I am happy to write, Woo has been the winner of an art prize and is currently preparing for her solo exhibition in Seoul and Daegu in later this year (October / November).
Artist profile
Informed by ideas developed in perceptual psychology, Woo explores ‘action space’: how we interpret our environment via spatial information acquired while moving through it and interacting with it. Indeed, she regards processes such as sketching and note making as a fundamental component of the final piece. This is most evident in her impressionistic paintings of trees, where she attempts to capture a dynamic point in space, rather than a stable moment in time, as a way of expressing the ambiguous essence of an object.
Who are your biggest artistic influences?
There are too many for me to be able to pick just one in a short period of time. I could pick the artist who influenced my work, or the artist who taught me the concepts or any of the artists who have helped me navigate through my career to date.
I really admire the works of Park Hyun-Ki, Adrian Ghenie and Ai Weiwei.
What is your dream project?
If I look back at my art to date, I think I started the process in a basic way, almost like a textbook, and my focus has been on ‘us’ as a society, so I would like to create some work using my friends as the subject matter. I would like to show the audience about my friends who have interesting and various points of views.
What has been the best piece of advice you have received as an artist?
Artwork comes from the artist’s life.
Can you tell me more about what that advice means to you?
I have learned a lot of the attitudes I hold towards my life from more mature people around me. I think the images that could be shown to the public or my thought towards the work could depend on how I spend my daily life. Therefore, apart from how they live now, I focus on their past and implied narratives of them.
When you start new pieces, what does your creative process look like? Do you plan each piece out before you start, or do you let it come to life as you go?
The subject of my paintings are trees that I see in my daily life.
First, I draw the detailed sketch and when I have finished the drawing I paint the first version. Then, when the dry process has finished I scatter them again and repeat the process until I am satisfied with the outcome.
Some trees have been the trees that I see around me every day, but I try to travel the place where it has a lot of trees. The trees that we find in nature, in comparison to those which are touched and trimmed by human beings can sometimes feel and look unfamiliar. In terms of non-painting work,* I usually start with those which I pass in my daily life.
*the first drawing
How do you overcome creative blocks?
I have two extreme ways to overcome: I either draw until I succeed, or I don’t draw at all that day (especially when I feel like I can’t make it).
Do you have a favourite piece of art that you have created?
I love my first piece of the ‘Foundation’ series.
I have an affection for this piece because it was a piece that I created when I was wondering and doubting the definition and limitations of painting.
Do you have any advice for other artists who are just starting out?
You don’t need to work hard to create a new thing. The piece resembles yourself is the art. If you have something to say, then stick with it, develop it and express it. That is what the artist does.
What has been the most challenging thing about being an artist?
Since my work is about recognition, I need to work on it until I get the abstract image of my recognition, but sometimes I struggle to express it.
What has been the best reaction someone has had to your artwork?
In 2020, during the Covid-19 Pandemic era, I made a work called ‘Awakening’, which was about what human beings are enjoying in nature for granted, what it costs and what nature needs to endure because of that, therefore what people need to think about it. I was able to talk to various audiences who are living in the same era.
Sometimes a member of the audience during an exhibition will tell me something that I have never thought before. I feel like all of us are the artists.
What do you hope people take away from your artwork?
My works are about recognition, and the audience is the last component that completes the piece. Please enjoy my work by connecting it with your own experience and feel it in your mind.
Faye’s comment
Woo’s told me that she considers the audience to be ‘the last component that completes’ a work of art, and hopes we are able to connect her art with our own experiences, and feel that in our minds.
Honouring that sentiment, which I find to be kind and heart-warming, I feel strangely reluctant to share my own personal thoughts and feelings about her art, and what makes it so special to me. I feel quite a deep and personal connection with her paintings (I have always found there to be something spiritual about trees) but beyond that I wish to keep why as something special that I only I know and understand. I hope that you feel the same way when you see her paintings, which are very special to me. I’m reminded of Mr Knightley in Jane Austen’s ‘Emma’….“If I loved you less, I might be able to talk about it more.’ I get the sense that the artist will understand and not mind this too much.
I would like to wish the artist the best of luck in her solo exhibitions later this year — I have ‘nodoubtttt’ that the exhibition will be a huge success and attract many a visitor who admires and appreciates her art 🙂
You can follow Woo Mi Ran at:
Instagram: @nodoubtttt
Pinterest: https://www.pinterest.co.kr/WooMiran/
Mail: aei97235@naver.com