Land scape of City

Land scape of City ● The modern city has a distinct character of duality in comparison with the city in the past. A city is, in a way, a Janustic existence containing good and evil together, in which unreconcilable dualities such as order and disorder, balance and imbalance, openness and closure, and cosmos and chaos coexist. In particular, our cities that have gone through radical changes in the past fifty years, and also Asian cities in a larger boundary, historically have a uniquely dualistic and double-faced nature that cannot be found in European cities. As Korean cities have continued in dramatic transformation and development under the influence and methodology of the United States after the liberation, the mixed characteristic between the traditional and the contemporary, and the indigenous and the foreign, is all the more prominent. Our cities with such a characteristic call for a perspective and an approach which are different from those for looking into Western cities. (The Urban View of Korea, Lee Kyu-Mok, 2002, p.197)

박능생_Seoul City Ⅵ_캔버스에 먹, 아크릴채색_140×291cm_2009

박능생_Busan City_캔버스에 먹, 아크릴채색_140×291cm×3_2011~2

A city is something that is seen, and something that is seen in all sorts of circumstances at that. In other words, a city is something that is seen in night and day, with wind and rain, and even in fog. It changes depending on the viewer, the circumstances and the emotions. And within the city coexist the successive time and synchronous time. The legends or myths of the past are a part of the daily life today; the city is where the touches of the ancestors who had looked after and accustomed this city in the past are still vividly passed down; the city is the special place we still remember. Therefore, when people are in a certain place, they are attracted to that spot and feel as if they are part of that place. Louis Kahn says that a city is 'a place where a small boy, as he walks through it, may see something that will tell him what he wants to do his whole life.' (As quoted in Urban Environment Design, Ko Sung-jong. Ko Pil-jong. Mijinsa, 1992, p.132) Such a feeling is variable depending on the person, the viewpoint or circumstances, but it is undeniable that the city has played a very special role in the modern civilisation. To view and reproduce the scenes of such a city with adoring and affectionate eyes is to escape from the typical idea of landscape, and is to depict realistically the scenes of life where contemporary people energetically live together in an ensemble, and to depict that absolute space.

박능생_Banpodong_혼합재료에 먹_215×150cm×4_2010~1

박능생_Dogsandong_혼합재료에 먹_215×150cm×4_2010~1

The theme of my works is the urban landscape and the natural landscape that we commonly come across in everyday life. The main subject matters include mechanised human beings, concentrated space, the ruined nature and city that are under redevelopment, human exclusion, the scenes of life related to the modern civilisation, the forrest of massive steel-framed buildings, the river cutting across the urban centre and so on. The city is a scene where we encounter in everyday life the movement to spread an autonomous and independent viewpoint in terms of the continuous experience and expression of the reality we live in. The mind that is conscious of the harmony and order of human beings and nature is inherent within the city, and I have attempted to reveal such harmony and order, and the ultimate meaning of formation. More specifically, I look at the urban scenes spread around our everyday life with my own novel viewpoint and feelings and I believe that there is a need to look at them with more serious attention whether figuratively or abstractly. This need is made acute because of social interrelatedness or cultural compatibility that makes it impossible to proceed while denying the relation with such urban environment and external world. whether figuratively or abstractly. By directly walking in the contemporary scenes, the complex and detailed changes are sieved through sketching and the appropriate form for an ideal city can be attained. The viewpoints that allows seeing from a distance, i.e. viewpoints such as the top of a building or a peak of a high mountain, homogenise space depending on the scale. In painting, space is a method to express one's own ideology or emotions through the composition of the picture. Hence composition is always newly developed without specific rules and new compositions should always be generated in drawings of a new era.

박능생_Time square_혼합재료에 먹_106×74cm_2012

박능생_Time square_혼합재료에 먹_106×74cm_2012

In Asia, a greater emphasis has been made on the inherent true nature and subjective elements rather than pursuing accurate depiction. The blanks are expressed through being left pure, occupying space in abstract composition under conscious intention. And it attains a significance, not as space that is naturally generated after drawing a certain object, but space that clarifies the outlines of the object. ● Thus, form within composition, is as the formation of the whole, placed and transformed in accordance with the artist's subjective formative intention. In the present days, such a formative nature of space has been emerging more sensationally and variedly than it was simply recognised in the paintings of the past. In order to attempt a contemporary space composition in my works, I have shown in diverse forms the drawing work with a story through images gathered from urban or everyday scenes and experiences. Furthermore, not leaving at drawing, I have recomposed on the pictures by formative modifications, simplification or realistic description through drawing. ■ PARKNUNGSAENG

Vol.20121107h | 박능생展 / PARKNUNGSAENG / 朴能生 / painting