[Gallery Walk] A Garden That Doesn't Exist in Jeju, and a Heart Revealed Before Our Eyes

Two Exhibitions Side by Side at Gallery Hyundai
Kim Bohee's 'TOWARDS: There Was Light' and Christine Kim Sun's 'Moon Mind'
When Nature and Mind, Two Different Worlds, Meet Through Memory

Standing before Kim Bohee's 'The Days,' one is struck first by its sheer size. The canvas, spanning 6.48 meters in width, is densely filled with heliconia, palms, ancient trees, and grass. In the middle of this forest, Leo, the black dog, lies peacefully. Leaves and trees, as tall as a person, seem to push viewers into the scene itself. It feels as if such a garden could exist somewhere in Jeju, but the artist immediately denies this.

Kim Bohui's 'Towards'. A work depicting a hill road leading to the beach in Jungmun, Jeju. Using the actual landscape as a starting point, the artist reconstructs the Jeju she has observed and remembered over time within the frame. Gallery Hyundai

"There’s no garden like this. It’s an imagined one." Although Kim Bohee’s paintings appear to depict real landscapes, they are, unexpectedly, far from reality. "I simply paint what I want to see," she said. She reconstructs in a single frame the palm trees from her Jeju home’s garden, the towering heliconia from the Yeomiji Botanical Garden, and the mountains and streams etched long in her memory. "You can say it is figurative, but in fact, I consider it abstract."

If so, perhaps the true model in her paintings is not Jeju itself, but rather the memory of someone who has observed Jeju for a long time. Kim Bohee settled in Jeju in 2003. At first, she wandered the island like a traveler, but after establishing her home and studio, her focus drew ever closer. The palm tree in the yard, camellias, fruits of the viburnum, figs, and her dog Leo. One day, she saw the sunset fall over the yard, transforming the colors of the trees and the earth entirely. "I liked it so much that I wanted everyone to feel it in the same way," she explained.

Yet her vision of Jeju does not remain a paradise. When an apartment block was built in front of her house, blocking the view of the sea, she said she felt so upset that for nearly a year she didn’t want to step out into her own yard. In the end, she built a wall of camellia trees. Then, one of the trees died, and through that gap, the sea began to be visible again.

"These days, I feel grateful," she said. This brief statement captures Kim Bohee’s landscapes quite precisely. While the scenery may stay the same, the heart of the observer changes. Or sometimes, it is the heart that shifts and thus alters the landscape itself.

Kim Bohee's 'Towards'. It captures the moment when the evening sunset settles over the garden of a house in Jeju, changing even the colors of the trees and soil. The artist said, "I loved it so much that I wanted everyone to feel it together." Gallery Hyundai

This transformation is also reflected in her use of color. In depicting the Jeju sea, she explained, "In shallow water, you get jade colors; in deep water, the shades become darker." However, when asked about the exact location, she drew another line: "I may borrow the colors from there, but no two places are exactly alike." Rather than faithfully replicating real nature, she is repainting memories, changed by light and the passage of time.

In another part of Gallery Hyundai, a completely different world unfolds. In Christine Kim Sun’s canvases, there are no forests or seas; only black circles, curves, and short English words remain.

Standing before her paintings, the artist touches her temple with her fingers, a gesture from American Sign Language meaning ‘Mind.’ "In my head, the mind feels like a lump, or sometimes like a rock," she said.

If Kim Bohee transforms visible nature into memories, Christine Kim Sun turns the invisible mind into matter. The mind becomes round, grows heavy, and collides with other minds. When a thought touches the mind, it's "Touch," and when this recurs, it becomes obsession. As time passes and the contact fades, the thought also gradually dissipates.

Christine Kim's Rock Mind. In this exhibition, she newly presented her shaped canvas work, expanding the concept of 'mind,' previously expressed through lines and symbols, into forms and physicality beyond the flat surface. Gallery Hyundai

Despite the strict visual language, unexpected moments of personal narrative seep into this exhibition. 'Worrississimind' is a playful twist on the musical term 'pianissimo.' Indicating a painting filled with repeated small ‘p’s, Kim said, "It quietly repeats worries at the back of my mind." Right next to it, 'Piano Therapy' is even more explicit, expressing the gradual comfort she found through therapy with three p’s.

"It feels like letting out a sigh." In the works of this artist, who has long examined the structures of society and language, sentences such as "I am worrying" or "Therapy has brought some relief" emerge. A single individual, once hidden behind grand narratives, makes their presence known. At the heart of this change lies 'Moon Mind.'

This is the first shaped canvas she is presenting in this exhibition. Two deep blue canvases hang vertically, separated by an expanse of white wall. The distance between the two is unspecified: it could be narrowed or widened. Even this empty space counts as part of the work.

'Moon' refers both to the moon and to her second daughter, Dal. "It also expresses that she is always within my heart." Having long explained the mind through language and symbols, the artist now creates distance and volume for the mind itself. What is interesting is that the two artists, starting from opposite directions, seem to approach each other’s territory.

Christine Kim Seon’s 'Mind Strong'. It conveys the idea that even when surrounded by emotions such as worry, fear, anger, and joy, the essence of the mind remains intact in the form of a perfect sphere. Gallery Hyundai

Kim Bohee’s paintings may appear figurative, but in reality, they are a montage of memory and imagination. Christine Kim Sun’s artwork seems abstract at first, but on closer inspection, it more closely resembles a diary inscribed with family, worries, therapy, and obsession. For one, nature gradually becomes the mind; for the other, the mind ever more material.

For both, it is significant that this exhibition is not merely a summary of past work. Kim Bohee has returned to Gallery Hyundai after 38 years, but she does not talk in retrospective terms. When asked why she continues to create large-scale works, she answered, "I still consider myself young, and while I can, I want to make as many major works as possible."

"I think I should try before it’s too late." Christine Kim Sun, likewise, does not settle into familiar drawing methods; she expands the scale of her work through new canvases, colors, and empty spaces. And so, what lingers at the end of both exhibitions is neither the grand forest nor the black circle.

In one corner of Kim Bohee’s garden painting sits a small red coffee cup. When asked why she included this minor object, she replied, "I wanted to leave a trace that I was there too..." In contrast, Christine Kim Sun leaves a deliberate gap between her canvases, not deciding on the exact distance between minds.

One artist left a trace of herself within the landscape, while the other left an empty space inside the mind. What these two parallel exhibitions at Gallery Hyundai ultimately reveal is not simply what was depicted, but rather, what remains after someone has observed the world for a long time. Both exhibitions are open through October 18.

This content was produced with the assistance of AI translation services.