Lexicon of Lines: Lee Sung-jae’s Autobiography in Art
In my youth, the cool floor was my canvas, and my imagination, untamed, sprawled across it in endless doodles. Little did I know then that these formless scribbles were the seeds of a future I could not yet envision. The turning point came in a middle school art class, where a simple sphere became my first rebellion. While others shaded with practiced strokes, I sharpened my pencil to a needle’s point, etching life into the circle with the precision of a cartoonist. My teacher’s words – “It looks like a cartoon” – became both critique and prophecy, setting me on a path I walk to this day.University years saw me dancing between disciplines, painting with the soul of an animator, exhibiting with the heart of a dreamer. I wrapped my works in profound words and thick textures, playing the part of the tortured artist. But art, like life, has a way of stripping away pretenses.
In 2016, standing before an audience with English stumbling on my tongue, technical limitations gnawing at my confidence, and personal tempests raging within, I found myself naked of artifice. It was in this vulnerability that I discovered my true voice. Now, my art breathes with “drawing-like characteristics” and pulses with “motion.” Each piece is a confession of the words I cannot speak, the consideration I cannot help but give, the caution that both binds and defines me. My meticulousness is my meditation, each delicate line a mantra of the unspoken.
Lee Sung-jae, Self-portrait
I am a collector of moments when the familiar suddenly shivers with strangeness. My landscapes are not just places, but states of being. The people I depict are more than figures; they are questions I ask of the universe, and sometimes, of myself.
In the eyes of a shaman grandmother, I saw the power of empathy, and in the swollen belly of my wife, I witnessed the miracle of creation. These experiences flow through my fingers, manifesting in gathered lines that speak of love, pain, wonder, and the infinite complexity of human existence. I do not seek to preach or teach through my art. Instead, I offer glimpses into the extraordinary ordinary, hoping to awaken in others the realization that their own lives are works of art, waiting to be recognized.Like the madeleine of Proust, I aspire for my creations to be keys unlocking forgotten rooms of memory and emotion. In the interplay of line and space, in the layers of meaning and material, I invite you to find reflections of your own story.
For in the end, is that not what art is? A mirror, a window, a door – all at once. Through my work, I continually rediscover myself, and in sharing it, I hope you might catch a glimpse of your own reflection, in all its beautiful complexity. This is my journey, my struggle, my joy. With each piece I create, I weave another thread into the tapestry of my existence, ever-evolving, ever-questioning, ever in awe of the world that inspires me and the art that defines me.
Citra Sasmita, Timur Merah Project XII: River With No End, 2023, commission artwork of Diriyah Biennale 2024. Photography by Marco Cappelletti. Courtesy of the artist and Diriyah Biennale, Riyadh Saudi Arabia.
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- Leesungjae
- Integer
- Purus diam