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Dreaming about ocean
Yoonha Lee
Whilst busily pacing around my kitchen, I noticed some dried up anchovies on my countertop. I felt compassion for them because instead of swimming in a vast ocean, they were just dried up tiny fish. They looked like me loosing the presence, sentiment and becoming stuffed slowly.
Well, let us bring another life force into the dried up anchovies.
Let us start a journey to find the alter ego.
The shapes that I paint, made by spreading Chinese ink, imagining ocean on Korean paper, is unusual. Unexpected mythical landscapes come to me as a pealing like ripples in the innermost recesses of the heart. I think of a story to interact with, even in ripples of sentiment. Many emotions crowd my mind as I stare for a long time at the small, dried up anchovies. I imagined the anchovies swimming freely and leisurely although sometimes they too felt lonely, longing for something, and getting frustrated. I look back at myself and feel that the anchovies and I become one, and I find myself swimming, so full of life.
I once thought that my heart had stopped, but I can feel it beating again. This causes changes from a tedious daily life into something that makes my heart flutter, so that I am able to look at surroundings -normally indifferently - but now, in a new way. I will free myself from my bondage, and try to see my free alter ego within me.
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A Journey to find alter ego
Seyoung Yoon
(Editor in Chief of Photography Art Magazine SAJINYESUL)
In the picture of the Photographer, Lee Yoonha, there is a dried up anchovy. The anchovy’s body is totally dried up and becomes ever smaller. Guided by his own scent, he seems to be lured by the smell of the sea. As long as he dreams of the sea, his life will never end. When he was caught in the net and lifted from the sea, his freedom was taken away as well as his body, however, he still has memories of once swimming freely in the open sea.
Lee was an ordinary housewife, always being on the trot in the kitchen, when by chance she noticed some dried up anchovies. These little creatures prompted her to dredge up her own dreams which seemed to have dried up, and this encounter gave her an opportunity to start this series.
Moreover, she recalled the sea which she left behind. She doesn’t remember how young she was but she felt full of hope in her childhood.
Now those dreams are seen too far in the distance, as the anchovies have lost their dreams. What Lee gives back to the sea in the form of the dried up anchovies represents the Artist’s desire to recover the lost sea of her childhood. She draws the sea, where the anchovies are able to swim freely, with Chinese ink on Korean traditional paper, just as if she holds a holy sacrament. A dried up anchovy’s body is permeable to sea water and the soft sensitivity is impressed upon Lee’s dried inner self, whilst the ink spreads on the paper. As the paper becomes moist, the drenched anchovy is finally able to move his atrophied fin and begin a fantastic journey to go back to the sea.
The anchovy’s long journey, passing through forests, exploring caves, crossing mountains, enduring piercing rain and wind, is almost the same as the Artist’s long voyage of self-discovery. Lee looked back to her past: what other memories came after she emerged from her mother’s body: the sea of matrix and were there some valuable things that she missed? For the Artist, this journey means a healing process of the deep scars within her, and a releasing of her dried up ego into the vast sea also.
We all want to be someone special. However, we are all very aware of how difficult it is to live as a woman in this country. Judging by her 20 years of work experiences, I can figure out that she has been just an ordinary housewife, a mother, and a teacher, but none under her own identity: Lee, Yoonha. Thus she started to retrieve her lost name through the ‘photograph’ before it became too late, indeed, the accidental encounter with a dried up anchovy was the beginning of her journey to find her alter ego.
Gazing at the photograph representing the dried up anchovy and an eye,
I was able to be assimilated into the Artist’s mind. As Confucious says:
‘That’s the very running water’. Lee seems to say “You have come this far” gazing at a dried up anchovy. She must be conscious of where she is now; as if the anchovy has come this far, and equates herself with the dried up anchovy. Thus she can bring him a dream to leave for the sea.
‘Sonata for Anchovy’ makes audiences ponder about women’s lives being just like empty shells. We have all come too far to get back to the sea, however, Lee says that we can have a dream of the sea.
What has made Lee remarkable is her capability of leading a dried up anchovy to full narrative. We can believe in her potential for she seems to be incredibly good at story-telling. So far, she has only told just one story. I recall what mothers used to say “When I write a novel of my own life story, it will be published as a set of books”. Lee may have to publish several photo-books as she is photo-shooting. She would have many stories to tell if she lives long enough for she has shown an eminent ability as a story-teller. Now, I’m waiting for her sequal to this first story of the beginning to find the alter-ego. I realize that an honest story is more emotional than any sweet plausible story, and ‘Sonata for Anchovy’ will be expected to be the foundation of her dream come true.
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Curriculum Vitae of Lee Yoonha
Solo Exhibition
2014 Lee Yoonha’s Invitation Exhibition, Gallery Index, Seoul, Korea
2012 Finding The Lost Dream(2012 Ahngook Pharm Gallery AG Young Artist Competition Exhibition), Gallery AG, Seoul, Korea
2010 Lee Yoonha’s Solo Exhibition 'Sonata for Anchovy', Now Gallery, Seoul, Korea
Group Exhibitions
2014 1st Contemporary Photography Competition Exhibition,Gallery Index, Seoul, Korea
2014 The Wonder III, Insa-Art Gallery, Seoul, Korea
2012 Hong Kong International Photo Festival 2012 'Parallel Visions - Japan and Korea Contemporary Photography Exhibition', Hong Kong Arts Centre, Hong Kong, China
2012 1st Chungmuro Photo Festival Project Space C, Chungmuro, Seoul, Korea
2012 The Wonder II, Insa-Art Gallery, Seoul, Korea
2011 Dreaming, Jeong-Dong Gallery, Seoul, Korea
2011 Seoul Photo Festival 2011 Special Exhibition(Portfolio Competition), Seoul Museum of art, Seoul, Korea
2011 Seoul Photo Fair, COEX, Seoul, Korea
2010 The Wonder, Kyung-In Museum of Fine Art, Seoul, Korea
2009 The Light of Mind, Kyung-In Museum of Fine Art, Seoul, Korea
2007 2nd Photo-league’s Members’ Exhibition, COEX, Seoul, Korea
2006 1st Photo-league’s Members’ Exhibition, Kyung-In Museum of Fine Art, Seoul, Korea
Publication
2010 Sonata for Anchovy, Sajinyesul, korea
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