Jin Kuigang, the constructor of the local context
Guitao Bao (Scholar/Curator)
Almost all of Kim Kyu-gang's oil paintings come from or are related to the native North Korea. In the history of contemporary Korean art, no painter has completely taken care of the geomorphological and phenological characteristics of the northern part of the Korean Peninsula like King Kong. Even, you can make any cut on the picture of his landscape oil painting, or re-select the scene and composition on his picture at will, and you will find that there is no problem. His landscape paintings are human fireworks in the north of the Korean Peninsula, which can be lived and traveled. Therefore, his long-term artistic creation is committed to expressing the "composition" of the real local context, and producing a large number of works, which can no longer be simply described as "feelings".
(Private Collection)
In fact, Jin Kuigang has practiced his distinctive ambitions through linguistic level, color processing, and compositional research, that is, he has tried to construct a large and unique vernacular context that is fully linked to the artist's life consciousness and experience through systematic depiction of the vernacular world. Therefore, his works not only complete the independent perspective of each painting, but at the same time, there is an internal correlation between all works or between most works. It is a detail that is split out of this vernacular context. Moreover, Kim Kyu-gang aims to achieve this goal. Through the "seasonal characteristics" presented by most works——— the midsummer season, the meaning of the situational space is constructed. And through the "green" color integration is highlighted in each scene.
In a sense, Jin Kuigang's landscape oil paintings are used to "live", not to "watch". The artist's creation of landscape themes does not need to bind a "living space", or even a beauty pageant process with a curious mentality. Obviously, for Jin Kuigang, who constantly uses his works to construct the exact "local context" in his heart, he is not painting a landscape painting with rural themes. Instead, it is a lifetime of artistic creation to prove that there is such a heavenly world, which is the local context of the northern part of the Korean Peninsula. It is composed of the basic and well-known elements of the local world, and is based on the geomorphological characteristics of the northern part of the Korean Peninsula, which is a complete world, not a "part" of the world. It's a real world, not a utopia.
Although landscape oil painting does not necessarily take the expression of human fireworks as a realm, landscape oil painting is not only based on the curiosity of walking and watching flowers. Jin Kuigang chose construction. Use each work to form a perspective, and spend thirty years enjoying this topic. The most important thing is that he still finds that the local context he constructs still has a new perspective and still brings him creative passion. Like the bottles and cans that Morandi has been constantly showing throughout his life, Kim Kyu-gang is also spending his life telling the outside world that there is a rural situation, although in the north of the Korean Peninsula, it can make the heart soft and happy like all nostalgic and obsessive rural complexes. Therefore, in the current context of North Korea reality, as an artist, Kim Kyu-gang's humanistic feelings transcend his era.
The "appearance" part of Jin Kuigang's landscape oil painting is the main keyword involved in the rural world, such as mountains, fields, rivers, houses, country roads, phenology, landforms, seasonal phases, vegetation, crops, chickens, ducks, geese and dogs. Used as symbols to construct the local context, these symbols are usually details of the rural world, allowing people to feel the so-called nostalgia or rural life from the symbols. But for King Kong, these symbols are not only used to construct the rural context, but most importantly, these symbols have clear suggestibility in his works, for example, he draws a country road, which will hint at where the country road leads, and how the country road in different environments is tortuous and extended. Drawing a river will suggest where it flows and where it comes from, and at the same time laying a clear picture of the river as an element of the environment. Painting a house will hint at the possible scenes in front of the house and behind the house, so that people with rural life experience can feel the link at once.
That is to say, as an artist, Jin Kuigang's experience of life in the rural world is not the symbolic appearance he has drawn in its entirety, but the fact that he integrates and combines these appearances to mark the parts of this rural context that are not depicted, the real life experience of rural life. Perception of all the life fields and details that form the "context". Kim Kwee-gang is constantly refining this grand plan by establishing an internal connection between most of his works.
Among contemporary North Korean landscape oil painters, no one explores the subtleties of ordinary life and how to hide in the landscape of being chosen. While constructing his own unique rural context, Jin Kuigang created the suggestive angle of this theme. Even, you can feel every part of the object in his work, he conceals the details and hints at the way to find, he seems to be keen to amplify the "like" outside the work in a way that suggests more "voice-over". Rather, he perfected the same situation of "habitable" but concealed the everyday.