KIM Hanna: The Triumph of Daily Life

Arario Gallery Seoul Samcheong is pleased to present the solo exhibition by Hanna Kim on March 22nd, 2012. Through various media including painting, drawing and sculpture, Kim has presented descriptive works that reflect the narratives in her own imagination. This exhibition presents works that boast an even more sophisticated application of composition and color, capturing the artist’s observations on this society.

Hanna and the Rabbit
To Hanna Kim, the rabbit is not just a mere subject of her work, but her best friend, and her other self that sustains her inner world. Kim’s works document stories about the artist and an imaginary rabbit that crosses over reality and fantasy. Kim’s previous works portrayed the first meeting with the rabbit to their accidental parting and searching for each other in desperation. After their short first encounter, they feel a mysterious sense of intense desperation for each other, which sends them searching for each other. After a turbulent journey of running away from danger or hiding in camouflage, the two finally reunite. The story ends as Hanna and the rabbit, finally together at last, create their own cozy nest in the cuckoo clock.
Because they are instable beings, Hanna and the rabbit long for each other and feel stable only when they are together. Through presenting both standpoints of herself and the rabbit, the artist allows the audience to share her and the rabbit’s fears, insecurities, and the sense of stability they feel when they’re together. Furthermore, the toy camera which the audience can operate proposes a third-person perspective that observes Hanna and the rabbit. Through this, the audience alternates from being incorporated into their relationship and being excluded as an observer, traversing across the boundaries of reality and fantasy. A fluent storyteller whose short narratives in different perspectives invite full interaction from the audience, Kim presents episodes about her daily life with the rabbit through this solo exhibition.

Hanna and the rabbit ‘triumphs’ by returning to daily life
The works in this exhibition bases its narrative on the greeting from an old woman in the artist’s neighborhood. The never-ending questions from her neighbors about graduating from school and getting a job diminish the sense of triumph the artist and the rabbit hold about their everyday life, and make them feel like failed youths. The neighbors’ greetings turn into consolation. As if not living up to a so-called successful life of going to a good university, getting a good job, and getting married is ruthlessly considered failing in life, the series of consolation from her neighbors perplex Hanna and the rabbit. However, Hanna and the rabbit continue fighting through the everyday life together doing trivial things like saving money and fighting sleep to exercise. They demonstrate that accomplishing the little things in life yesterday and today, and living life in the present is what really brings victory in daily life, rather than arriving at goals set by the society.

While the daily life episodes with Hanna and rabbit are like scenes from a fairy tale with pastel tones and unique composition focusing on the character, what can also be read from the paintings is the spirit of the ‘880,000won generation’ of today. Hannah and the rabbit’s calm soliloquy-like works offer a great deal of comfort to today’s hard-working youths who try their best and live life to the fullest, but still have difficulties getting a job. Much more abundant in color and depth, The Triumph in Daily Life presents over thirty paintings, video, drawing and sculpture works that activate the imagination by crossing over reality and fantasy.