Landscapes are composed of countless overlapping layers. I divide this landscape structure into flat layers of time and scene. Each layer of the landscape, thus dismantled, remains clear, regardless of distance or scale. And all layers carry equal weight. Between these numerous layers, what I see are fragments, byproducts—scenes of ruins, dismantled layers. The scenes we call ruins don't simply refer to those that collapse and disappear due to certain circumstances or events. They also encompass a disorderly state of incompleteness or an unspecified state of confusion within the landscape. For example, they encompass the piles of demolished garbage or the abandoned, surplus land we encounter on the street. These fragmented landscapes, or ruins, always exist as an axis of the overlapping layers of our lives, never disappearing from our senses. Like long-deposited strata, these layers exist within the present landscape. Ruins thus survive from form to sensation.
I view ruins to pursue the sensation of ruin. That sensation is a ghostly, phantom-like thing, difficult to articulate in clear terms. What is clear is that when this sensation becomes visible within the landscape's timeline, we question and mourn its very existence. Therefore, we experience this landscape's process at every moment, encountering a new landscape. Ultimately, the present landscape exists atop the ruins.
My paintings exist between these countless layers of landscape. They occupy the timeline where the ruins' forms linger, and like afterimages, they sensitize the ruins in the present and future. In other words, ruins postpone life. Yet, even in the extremes of the landscape—overturned, and excavated—life resists and sublimates. The sublimity of the landscape prompts us to contemplate each object, from its texture to its individuality, amidst the mixed heaps. And it leads us to mourn the landscape of tomorrow.