ARTIST NOTE
 
Sky, Land and Silence
 
by Keun-ho Cho

There are sky and land in nature and here is silence. It means 'nature' exists itself. Nature is the state as it is without adding man's force. But, as man lives with nature, man's force influences nature and its trace exists with nature in the name of civilization. The appearance of nature harmonized well with man which embraces man's traces with its generous heart is so beautiful. I like such a silence. Strong colors are not more beautiful than mindless natural colors to me. I have made Zen of complete absence of ego and emancipation drawn from such a mindless nature the basic principle of my mind and created my works with the theme of silence, the root of oriental spirit. My recent works are dim like photographs taken by dimming camera focus and simple colors near to monochrome by moderation of colors are used on misty canvas in order to express sky, land and silence. My canvas is surrounded with silence as it shows landscape before eyes after waking up. But when you fix your eyes ad look into it, there are a sound of the air in the silence, a movement of tranquil wave with a breeze and a bright glitter of sunset light over the water surface. The silence in works expressed with indistinct colors and shapes to eliminate complexity is my intention to draw static factors which are the root of oriental spirit and reach the state of Zen. I use landscapes with water and mountains as my major materials. These materials are frequently found in traditional landscape paintings. I choose our ancestors' favorite materials to rediscover a novelty from traditional spirit and try to make a work through modern reinterpretation of them with the vision of this era. I intend to put forth bud of healthy artist's spirit representing this era at the root of Asian traditional spirit. Although a variety of digital technologies based on development of mechanical culture have been introduced to art and expression methods of art works have been diversified, artists' spirit inherent in their inside should be rooted in their essence which can look into this era and themselves exactly and raise an exact voice. The silence immanent in a series of these silent landscapes will be continuously appeared in my works as a constant topic to be solved. The silence brings modern people who are exhausted in rapidly changing modern society a time for rest. I wish to give modern people a time for easy and silent rest and communicate the message of hope toward the world through my works rooted in the Asian traditional spirit.