Wandering Waves, Scattering Farewells

Soho Park (The necessaries)

Where Longing Wells Up

As humanity evolved from primal societies to civilization, humans came to occupy the apex of the ecosystem, standing over other species and life forms. Humans have built fences and constructions that guarded them from the wild while watching other species vanish into time. What enabled humans to distinguish themselves from—and rule above—other creatures on Earth was the innate spectrum of emotions: sorrow, joy, anger, pleasure, and all in between. Through one another’s expressions, humans sensed danger; through actions and sounds, they communicated and cooperated. As a species, humans united, and with greater efficiency and speed built the utopias they envisioned. Yet while the emotions have allowed them to remarkably thrive, they also inflicted great losses. Among the countless pieces of emotional experiences, the first drop of tear one sheds at the very first breath of life carries profound meaning. That droplet—an inaugural utterance—might be pain, grief, or rage, and it engraves and reflects myriads of colors and shadows onto the faces from infancy, childhood, youth, and into old age. The human visage, the countenance, bears the imprint of tears evaporated in sorrow, and also is a transparent and deep reservoir that swells with unspoken hopes for tomorrow. As we fill this reservoir of profound feeling, we stand before an irrevocable farewell to the primordial wild we can never reunite with.

Creases of Time, Wandering Waves

Planes overlay on lines, and upon those lines planes are laid. Yoojin Cho’s canvas is a peculiar plane where lines and surfaces intermingle yet remain distinct. At times they float in clusters; at others, thin strands of time drift. The space that emerges expansively is captured as a flat space with texture. It resembles that of a coated photograph. The artist does not set a predefined period or setting; instead, she observes the changing environments and temperatures over days that flow in gentle undulations. This process resembles keeping a journal where events and occurrences that unfold over time are recorded. However, the scenes captured in manners of diary Cho expresses are quite different in many senses. The imagery can not be rendered originating with nouns, nor described with specific narratives or stories. Rather, as if seeking a lost home of memories or yearning for the original form of a vanished utopia, the artist lays a soft and gentle breath onto the canvas. Thus, the drifting blue planes and lines evoke myriad images and sensations. Just as blue can hold both coolness and chill, and red can share warmth and heat, Cho’s paintings permit the countless hues and forms reflected in each viewer’s gaze. They create a multivalent space where irreconcilable stories and emotions—joy, sorrow, love, and pleasure—intersect without merging. In this humble yet profound reservoir lie the embers of our own emotions and an embrace for the enduring creases of time.

Her canvas is like a transparent reservoir that can hold deep blue waters and spread red light. Upon first encountering Yoojin Cho’s paintings, one discovers vibrant, lines in many colors drifting across the thin surface—each imbued with painstaking, tranquil movement. They follow no predetermined pattern or structure. Like gentle ripples that embrace both sunlight and moonlight, like a song born of blue and red yearning for one another, serene wandering traces of fingertips cross the canvas. They evoke feelings of loss, a sense of nostalgia, a delicate touch stroking sealed creases of time locked away in past moments. Though the pigments are physically set on the canvas, they dance softly like notes playing a musical score. Cho’s work thus conjures audiovisual sensations—not reproducing or depicting some object, but guiding our eyes to wander. The artist’s blue reservoir carries the deep waters of time and lets through the thin creases of light—an interstitial space where tears of joy and laughter of sorrow converge.

Perhaps, Farewells Vanish and Scatter

In the three‐dimensional world we experience, time flows in one direction. Maybe the life we believe to lead is just a track we walk toward the oblivion called death. Depending on where we place our coordinates and where we direct our gaze, the shape of our time takes vastly different forms. Yet nothing is eternal in the current of time; all that inhabits this earth treads toward destruction. In Yoojin Cho’s paintings is inscribed a dance that acknowledges and submits to this finite spatiotemporal condition. Though none of us can tell what’s to come in the fleeting time, Cho’s works bid farewell to the figures along the way. The gestures embrace the moments where tomorrow and yesterday intersect around today and are imbued with anticipation for what’s to come in the new phenomena and ruminations over flashes of memories that surface unexpectedly. Cho’s paintings speak for themselves: born with departure, encounters, loss, and passings, we all carry the same name and greeting of “farewell.” They form a space that collects scattered farewells across the river of time, where emotions from either side—opposing faces and expressions—can confront one another. Cho’s blue canvases offer a permissive surface open to layers of meanings and vocabularies for interpretation: it is a space of pluralistic realm where “erasing” and “drawing” float on the same lines of time and become synonyms, where time before names and language resides, and where anonymous names may dwell.

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