Viewers could easily be excused for thinking that they are looking up at a night sky when they see Hyung Jin
Park’s paintings. The surfaces of these works are dotted with transparent beads that sit along the outlines of his subjects,
giving them the appearance of constellations. The glittering bits of light are often connected by mesh threads, furthering
the effect of stars that are gathered into recognizable images by the viewer’s mind. The appearance of those images is
highlighted by shifts of color within their borders that seem to physically lift them up from their backgrounds.
But it isn’t just the heavens that are reflected in these works.
Those mesh threads also look as if they could be fishing nets, and the hazy yet glowing fields of color they are placed against
could just as easily represent the shades of deep water as they could a darkened sky. The artist, who was born in Seoul,
South Korea, says that he “grew up longing for nature” and that fishing was not only a way for him to spend time, but was
also a sort of backdrop for the development of his thoughts.
As expressed on his canvases, those thoughts encompass influences including ancient and medieval art and Wassily
Kandinsky, whose elegant sense of line is echoed in the delicate lines covering these remarkable canvases.