Flowing Layers

PIPE GALLERYS는 2022년 첫 전시로, 3월 4일부터 4월 2일까지 홍성준(b.1987)의 개인전 **<Flowing Layers>**을 개최한다.

이번 전시의 제목 **<Flowing Layers>**는 홍성준 작가가 회화의 근본적 재료에 대한 연구를 통해 이뤄낸 결과를 흐르는 빛과 물 그리고 하늘이라는 근원적 형상에 대한 서사와 함께 한 장의 종이처럼 단편적으로 제시한 것을 뜻한다. 이번 전시는 홍성준의 2022년 신작 페인팅을 포함하여 22여 점의 Layers Series 페인팅과 설치작품이 공개되며 **<Flowing Layers>**전시를 저본으로 삼은 전시 도록을 함께 출간한다.

“스스로 작업을 하면서 겪게 되는 소재의 선별 과정에 대한 형상화를 고민한다”는 홍성준은 이번 신작을 위해 “여태까지 수집된 이미지칩들을 선별하고 다양하게 구성하여, 허공에 떠 있는 듯이 형상화 시키거나 픽셀화와 같은 느낌으로 표현하면서 회화가 가진 층위와 물성에 집중했다”라고 전했다. 물감 그 자체로만 이루어진 설치작품부터 10호 크기의 페인팅까지 여러 이미지로 이루어진 PIPE GALLERY의 전시 Flowing Layers에서는 홍성준의 회화 매체에 대한 연구와. 그것을 층층이 쌓아 올려 만들어낸 매력적인 작품들을 만날 수 있다.

PIPE GALLERY is holding its first exhibition of 2022, a solo exhibition by Hong Seong Joon (b.1987) titled <Flowing Layers>, from March 4 to April 2.

The title of this exhibition, <Flowing Layers>, refers to how Hong Seong Joon presents the results of his research into the fundamental materials of painting in a fragmentary way, like a single sheet of paper, along with a narrative about the elemental forms of flowing light, water, and sky. This exhibition will feature Hong Seong Joon's new 2022 paintings, including about 22 works from his Layers Series of paintings and an installation, and an exhibition catalog based on the <Flowing Layers> exhibition will be published as well.

Hong Seong Joon, who “contemplates the visualization of the material selection process experienced while working,” said that for this new work, he “focused on the layers and physical properties of painting by selecting and diversely composing the image chips collected so far, visualizing them as if they were floating in the air or expressing them with a pixelated feel.”

In the PIPE GALLERY exhibition <Flowing Layers>, which consists of various images from an installation made of paint itself to a size 10 painting, you can encounter Hong Seong Joon's research on the medium of painting and the attractive works created by stacking it up layer by layer.

Among all the conditions of painting, Hong Seong Joon focuses on the most fundamental: materials. His profound contemplation on the physical property of materials is expressed in his portrayal of their variations. Hong has a fascinating way of navigating the change on the canvas surface brought by the materialistic conditions of chosen and mixed pigments, an element often translated as the thickness in paintings. And strata of layers created through this process are once again transfigured in his canvas, this time, much thinner.

Hong’s series of work on layers in <Flowing Layers> is filled with dynamic energy. Hong oscillates between the two ends of spectrums that can be described as ‘flat grid created by pieces of Korean paper,’ ‘sense of volume created by overlapped and flat layers,’ ‘digital materials and analog matière’ and so on. Vanished is the monolithic theory of painting as the artist sways between these paradoxes, and the layers of ideas that once defined painting become lighter and lighter as if they are the fluttering pages of a chapter on the history of painting from an art history book.

<Flowing Layers> by Pipe Gallery focuses on how Hong’s paper-thin layers contain the saga of fundamental images that the artist uncovered during his research on the basic element of paintings. His series on layer is like a door to the world of layered memories that invites us to the time we forgot and the stories we lost. Opening this door—standing in front of Hong’s work— feels like asking a simple question to approach something most fundamental, all the while feeling the sky, wind, and infinity with great freedom.

I hope that the energy and the liberated power of imagination in Hong Seong Joon’s work will be as powerful as they are to all those who visit this exhibition.