Art Born at the Boundaries: Jinny Yu's Questions on Belonging

• Jinny Yu, a proud Korean-Canadian artist who captivated the Venice Biennale and was selected by the National Gallery of Canada.
• Using mirrors and aluminum in place of canvas, she elevates the lives of all of us living as outsiders into dazzling art.
• Let us step into her world, where she breaks down boundaries and expands the territory of empathy through the gaze of a 'Perpetual Guest.'

Within the Korean-Canadian community, there is an artist whom we must remember and take great pride in. It is Jinny Yu, a professor of visual arts at the University of Ottawa and one of the most influential artists of Korean descent on the global stage. As a 1.5-generation artist who was born in South Korea and immigrated to Canada, she goes far beyond simply being a 'painter who draws well'; she is a master in the mainstream art world whose work has been spotlighted by Canada's largest daily newspaper, The Globe and Mail, and eagerly collected and exhibited by top institutions like the National Gallery of Canada and the Art Gallery of Ontario (AGO). Her status was symbolically cemented in 2015, when her work addressing the refugee crisis received global acclaim at the world's most prestigious Venice Biennale.

If we look closely at why Jinny Yu's work is so special, the secret lies in the 'surfaces' she uses. Instead of typical fabric canvases, she uses aluminum panels or mirrors. She applies oil paint onto them, which works a very peculiar kind of magic. When you stand in front of a painting drawn on a mirror, the 'I' viewing the work and the 'space' where I am standing are reflected exactly as they are within the picture. In other words, the painting is not fixed; rather, it is newly completed every time you move and every time the light changes. Though it looks like a two-dimensional painting, it is actually a 'three-dimensional spatial art' and an 'installation art' that draws in the presence of the viewer.

People might want to give her the nickname, 'the painter of mirrors reflecting boundaries.' This is because a mirror reflects objects exactly as they are, but at the same time, it reveals a virtual world that is different from reality. Caught between the two worlds of Korea and Canada, and not fully belonging to either, the hearts of us immigrants standing on the boundary seem to be flawlessly captured by Jinny Yu upon that mirror-like aluminum. Within her works, we may see the solitude of an outsider, but at the same time, do we not also discover a new beauty blossoming on that boundary?

Jinny Yu describes her own work through the concept of the 'Perpetual Guest.' This refers to the subtle feeling of being a stranger, whether she is living in Canada or visiting Korea. However, she does not view this with sadness. Rather, she believes that the objective perspective one can only possess as a 'guest,' along with the delicate sensibility to discover the gaps in spaces that the host cannot see, are her greatest assets as an artist. Therefore, her work goes beyond merely expressing her own diasporic sentiment; it perhaps poses a philosophical message that all of us navigating modern society are inevitably guests to someone else.

It can be inferred that one of the artists she respects the most is the Canadian abstract painter Guido Molinari. This is because, while inheriting his spirit of exploring the rigorous structures of space and color, Jinny Yu infuses those cold structures with the impassioned, human stories of 'migration' and 'identity.' Her works also bring to mind the Indian master Zarina Hashmi. While both artists deal with themes of 'home' and 'movement,' the difference lies in the fact that while Zarina depicted the pain of loss through static printmaking, Jinny Yu uses mirrors, sound, and massive installations to offer us a vivid experience, as if we are standing right in the middle of the scene of migration itself.

A piece we must deeply understand is her magnum opus that shook Venice in 2015, Don't They Ever Stop Migrating?. This work, with an unsettling title, addresses the European refugee crisis. The artist questions how mass media fosters fear by describing refugees not as human beings, but as 'swarms' or 'waves.' She draped an entire large room with semi-transparent fabric and poured countless black ink brushstrokes over it. Upon entering the room, one hears the sharp voices of women sampled from Hitchcock's film The Birds. As fear-laced remarks like, "Where did you come from?", "What's going on?", and "You're scaring the children!" echo from all sides, viewers feel as though they themselves have become the rejected refugees.

At first, these sounds feel bewildering and frightening, but standing still and looking at the painting in front of you changes your mind. This is because you realize just how gracefully and delicately those seemingly rough black brushstrokes move on the fabric swaying in the wind. "Could it be that the fear we feel toward strangers actually stems from our own ignorance?" the artist asks. This work is not simply a slogan to help refugees; rather, it serves as a warm invitation to break down the walls in our hearts that turn others into 'monsters' and to begin a dialogue of empathy.

Thanks to such profound introspection, her works are permanently collected by prestigious Canadian institutions including the Montreal Museum of Fine Arts, the Musée national des beaux-arts du Québec, and the Ottawa Art Gallery. Recently, she proved her formidable presence once again by holding a solo exhibition at the Art Gallery of Ontario (AGO). As a Korean-Canadian artist, Jinny Yu seems to want her works to serve as a 'platform for discussion' that draws out fundamental questions concerning our society's pluralism and multiculturalism, rather than being read merely as the 'sorrows of an immigrant.'

Jinny Yu is currently working vigorously, traveling between Ottawa and Berlin. Starting from her personal experience as a 1.5-generation immigrant, her artistic world has now expanded into the issues of 'coexistence' and 'hospitality' that all of humanity must ponder. It is no exaggeration to say that her journey, standing tall as a global master while preserving the Korean spirit in the vast land of Canada, serves as a source of deep pride and inspiration not only to the diaspora community but to all who love art. Looking at our own reflections in the mirror, why not listen to the profound and warm questions Jinny Yu poses? Perhaps we can all imagine, just once, being a warm host or a gracious guest to someone else.