[비즈한국] An exhibition by artist Lee Young-soo, famous for his paintings of water droplets on leaves, is being held. Khalifa Gallery (CEO Son Kyung-ran) will host Western-style painter Lee Young-soo's solo exhibition, 'Vanitas in a Water Drop,' from the 19th to July 11. This exhibition features about 20 paintings by the artist, who has explored the flow of life and time by capturing the fleeting moments of nature.
The signature subject matter of Lee Young-soo's paintings is the glistening water droplet, or dewdrop, resting on a leaf. As the title of this exhibition suggests, the artist uses these droplets to demonstrate transience—in other words, Vanitas.
'Vanitas' is a long-standing tradition in art history that contemplates the finiteness of human existence and the transience of life. While artists of the past symbolized death with skulls or withered flowers, Lee Young-soo reinterprets this in a modern way through the 'water droplet,' which contains the inevitability of its own extinction at the very moment of its fullness. The dew that forms on leaves at dawn glitters beautifully in the sunlight, but soon evaporates and disappears.
Rather than directly expressing death, his water droplets quietly emphasize that moments of life are all the more precious and beautiful because they must fade away. This resonates with the context in which Damien Hirst deals with life and death. However, instead of grand declarations, Lee Young-soo adopts a quiet and deep approach of contemplation, capturing the cycle of life within a single drop of water.
This exhibition, in particular, showcases the artist's artistic expansion beyond his previous highly detailed photorealistic paintings. The 10 new works do not merely stop at reproducing the appearance of the subject. By adding free brushwork and a flexible flow of color, he has pictorially captured moments created by the movement of light, air, and wind.
Extreme realism naturally transitions into abstraction, and the abstract sense is again reduced to the reality of nature. This proves that, beyond a simple change in painting style, the artist's perspective on nature has deepened into a more internal and contemplative realm.
Regarding the change in his style, artist Lee Young-soo explained, "In my previous work, the water droplet acted as a microcosm reflecting the world within it in great detail, serving as a lens to look back on life by containing a cosmic order and sensibility. In this exhibition, rather than following the world reflected in the droplet with photorealism, I have expanded the canvas to include the grass on which the droplets form and the texture of the wind and air, leading to a more contemplative (non-figurative) atmosphere."
The artist said, "Just as the saying goes, 'don't just look at the trees, look at the forest,' I have laid out the moments of forming and fading all at once. I hope that visitors, while viewing my work, will be able to face their own time and memories more deeply and contemplate them."
A spokesperson for Khalifa Gallery stated, "This exhibition will allow visitors to experience another world contained within a water droplet," adding, "We hope it will be a time of deep contemplation, reflecting on the meaning of life, time, and existence through this record of the most beautiful moments of a finite life."