Song, Jae-Gwang

After graduating with a B.F.A. degree from Choong-Ang University, Seoul, Korea, Jae Gwang Song pursued his education at the Art Student League of New York. He detached himself from the chaos of Seoul, and work in the United States in peace and solitude. He paints with music and memories of his encounter with nature and seasonal changes around the world. The current series of " In Memory" is seeing the burgeoning plants and flowers through the cracks in the snow-laden countryside. He said, "These recent memory series are some emotional reappearances of the things which I have observed and perceived long ago. They are my everlasting nostalgia, which has been buried under the stress and pressure of our complex life. The images of my work evolved from photographs and videotapes taken through the long journey which included mountains, seashores and deserts."

Working with multi-layers, he prepares an initial ground with many hues over which he interacts with the successive layer of translucent white. Within the uneventful space, there emerge signs of vitality marked with pure geometric shapes. Thus, he attracts those who have affinities and creates a link to a state of existence removed from the chaotic life.

Prior to this series, Jae Gwang Song attempted to paint his excitement of seeing a shadow of branches of flower blossoms on to the paper shoji screen of Asian homes. He recreated a mental image of a blossom supported by its branch as a silhouette where the single blue-gray color magically glowed its soft light._ Lydia Takeshita (ArtCore Center director)