KI YOONG
SOLO SHOW: PAUL SMITH ALBEMARLE STREET
THE SILENT AND ABLAZE
JULY - AUGUST 2019
A sky on a Thursday evening. A rose cut from a bush that lines the pathway to a door. A face seen from far away; all here like tokens plucked from a dream.
Take a seat on a park bench for a minute or two, look up and watch the clouds move. Into the scene flies a small bird, he perches on the edge of a rose’s branch. He’s very still, the only movement in the scene are the slow ripples of the lake beyond him. The little bird looks up to the sky, contemplating the enormous open world he inhabits up there, and with some extreme weightlessness and want to be part of it again, takes flight.
Looking at what’s around us and recording it in pencil or paint stops us taking things for granted. By drawing it, with appreciation I give it my total attention, as worthy of attention as anyone or anything, for existence is the incredible mystery and miracle we share.
And these portraits, despite their discretion and secretiveness ask to be looked at. Through their absolute stillness and silence they meet your gaze with theirs and mirror in you that same stillness and silence. They look out at the world in front of them and invite you to do the same.
