Hur Seung Hee’s works, at first glance, are dark and melancholy. They go well with autumn, the season when leaves change their colors and winds turn colder. The artist attempts to instill empathy, which spreads warmth into the underlying sentiments. This is why her works are in harmony with autumn and winter. She places characters in a calm setting, and traces their emotions. The characters serve as mirrors for herself as well as viewers.

The artist’s earlier works in 2010 were mostly paintings of someone sitting along or the back view of a woman with shoulders hunched. The artist was expressing herself through the woman’s determination to start again despite experiencing despair. Her sense of loneliness while raising two children led to a thirst for art, and she found comfort and courage in the act of drawing.

The artist exhibits a distinct visual memory and sensitivity. Her gaze shifted from a back to the side and front of her characters. She added movement by having her characters walk instead of sitting down. The characters increased in number from one to two persons or even small groups, and expanded from women to men, boys, and girls. She draws nature as viewed by characters outside the canvas, and sometimes introduces animals based on her experience of interacting with her cat. These changes indicate that she has matured as an artist, both in scope and depth. Her diverse subjects free her of artistic boundaries are provide greater freedom.

The artist remains consistent in her theme and artistic expression regardless of subject matter. She aims to catch and portray our deepest emotions. Her simply use of lines and colors gives viewers more space to empathize and connect. Space is especially important in her works. She spends the most time on coloring the background, repeating the process of painting and scraping to create depth on top of space. A perfectionist, she sometimes destroys her own paintings, or paints over them until she is satisfied.

This exhibition introduces several of the artist’s recent large-scale paintings, which range from landscape to portraits. The artist wishes to draw paintings that re easily approachable, convey everyday emotions, and, in doing so, deliver warmth. The space in her dark but deep paintings is full of possibilities. People tear up when watching sad movies, and start reflecting on life when they stop on autumn leaves. In a similar sense, views will feel calmly comforted as they stand before the artist’s works.

-Curator Jiyeon Jeong