Bienvenu Steinberg & C is pleased to present Korean artist Peter Kim second solo exhibition with the gallery. Curated by Barbara Stehle, the exhibition will feature the artist’s new body of work entitled “Fragment,” composed of works on paper and sculptures.

The title “Fragment” evokes something sparse and incomplete. It could be of any origin: a fragment of nature, a broken object, a partial view. The artist points to the fact that there is no totality represented. We will not see the whole thing, but what we will see, we will see in detail. The compositions are focused, few elements are highlighted. What are the pictorial and sculptural times? Is the series addressing the remains of things passed? A cut of the now or a glimpse of what is to come? There is no certainty. Things are afloat as Kim likes them to be.

Peter Kim's new paintings are related to the genre of landscape, but their divided marks and drastically reduced palette bring them close to abstractions. Kim’s slender sculptures are equally in between realms, evoking organic material and architectural construct. The artist turns to nature and to minimalism as an antidote to materialism. Kim says that the works are a response to his discomfort with the senseless consumerism and the furious pace of our society.

Born in 1967, Peter Kim grew up during a troubled period in South Korea. The political context with its violent dictatorial repressions was extremely difficult to bear. After his training at the school of fine arts, Kim soon left Korea for Germany, then France and eventually the United States, where he now lives and works. 

Peter Kim has developed his artistic practice between cultures. The artist marries the personal expression he acquired during his Western stays with an Eastern reserve and control. The series contains a high degree of intensity within the philosophical order of a Confucian composition. The haunting beauty of the classical Korean master Jeong Seon's mountain and water scenes resonates in many of Kim’s compositions. But Kim’s territory remains eerie, his world filled with an otherworldly nature, mineral and densely textural.

Kim’s poetics of space is made of abundance and restrain. White marks repeat themselves over and over, rhythmically veiling the ground behind them, until a peaceful presence takes place. The artist minimalist brushstrokes alternate between a great softness and a rough impasto. One thinks of Monet, of Robert Ryman at times. Reflecting on his work, Peter Kim likened his act of painting white over a composition to meditative gestures erasing his unnecessary thoughts. Kim’s humble humanity and mindfulness is combined in his act of painting, both an expression of the self and a spiritual meditation practice. “Fragment” is a space between quiet and disquiet.

Please join us for our Artist Talk series with Peter Kim on Saturday, October 12 at 11AM at the gallery.