Heejo Kim – Boooooom! – Create *inspiring *community *art*design *music *movie *photo*project

Selected paintings by Korean artist Heejo Kim. Kim received the BFA and MFA BFA from the Leroy E. Hoffberger School of Painting at the Maryland School of Art in Baltimore, Maryland. Kim’s practice focuses on rebuilding identity and existence through relationships with others and objects, and explores ambiguity by removing visible markers of identities such as gender, age, and race. She allows her characters to quietly “become” rather than act. Roland Barthes’s concept of tenderness also informs her work as a moral model of “isolated from the world” and the concept of Buddhist dependence (yeongi-sull) (Yeongi-Sull) – “I exist because of your existence, and your existence because of me.” This philosophy shows that understanding oneself is never a lonely act, but a process deeply rooted in relationships – with others, space and time. ” Kim’s character embraces the uncertain space between oneself and others, stillness and potential interconnection:

“The numbers in my oil paintings often lack visible facial expressions; in some works, their eyes and mouths are completely gone, leaving only the nose and ears. This ambiguity blurs the boundaries between the self and others, causing the Buddhist concept to evoke the concept of Anatta (“non-seff” (“non-natural”), which teaches this identity to be constantly perpetuated by connections in relationships.”