Touched Moments
“Sometimes, when one is moving silently through such an utterly desolate landscape, an overwhelming hallucination can make one feel that oneself, as an individual human being, is slowly being unraveled. The surrounding space is so vast that it becomes increasingly difficult to keep a balanced grip on one's own being. The mind swells out to fill the entire landscape, becoming so diffuse in the process that one loses the ability to keep it fastened to the physical self.”------ Haruki Murakami
While I was traveling across the country, I photographed many moments that deeply touched me. I was grabbed by these moments and staring out into the vast landscape, I allowed myself to be open.
2024 NEW WORKS
These works portray the moments I experience during daily activities. The essential components of each image are rendered by building up layers of paint while adding and subtracting visual elements and details. Through visual flatness, I aim to infuse the landscape with a touch of poetry and take it to a deeper level.
The images capture the unique pleasure I experienced during my walk in the woods. With the fall breeze, flower petals flutter in the air. I admire the effect of the sun’s rays on the changing textures of the flowers as it reinforces the arrival of autumn. While my work realistically portrays ordinary nature, my goal is to communicate a sense of poetry. The paintings aim to evoke an emotional response from the viewer.
My goal is to appreciate the ordinary aspects of the world we live in through nature’s sounds and observations of the movements and reflections in the water. The interaction among trees, pond, and water provides fascinating subject matter.
In midsummer, the landscape transforms into a tapestry of rich, verdant greens, celebrating life itself. Every leaf and blade seems to radiate with the energy of the season, inviting you to immerse yourself in the lush embrace of nature. The air is filled with the earthy scent of thriving vegetation, while tree branches sway gracefully in the gentle breeze, adorning every corner with leaves and creating dappled patterns of sunlight. The interaction among earth, sky, and leaves provides limitless subject matter, offering a symphony of colors and textures for those who pause to appreciate the beauty of this vibrant season.
2023 NEW WORKS
In these paintings, I continue my study of textures using a combination of abstract and true-to-form representation. I tried to create a balanced mix of both forms in each piece in a way that comes most naturally to me.
Surrounded by the Lowcountry’s magnificent views, I was always inspired by drapes of Spanish moss, and I wanted to celebrate its shape and color. My initial idea was to focus on texture. When determining the type of brushstroke to use- be it tighter applications that serves detail or looser applications that serves abstract moods and emotions‑ I am comfortable experimenting with different strokes before settling on my concept. In these two paintings, the Spanish moss draping in limbs of oak trees create a rhythm for shapes with some needle-like, curly leaves reflecting brilliant sunlight. These works of art also emphasize a certain atmosphere to create different moods. Some parts of the paintings are more detail-oriented, and other parts of the paintings evoke more emotion with less clarity.
Nature is a wonderful escape from the complexities of life. I constantly visit familiar locations in Charleston to capture the special conditions of each season, and I always find myself drawn to an ordinary scene of peacefulness and relaxation. It is my desire to share the special bond that humans have with the natural beauty surrounding us, which is often lost in the day-to-day challenges of life.
In these two paintings, the prevalent texture, the varying bushes, and the sand and the grass distinguish intricate details that lead to a more intimate expression.
Year after year the blue ridge mountains change to brown, and grey colors that showcase a breathtaking display of autumnal hues. Various shades of brown, ranging from deep russet to warm sienna, dominate the scene as the leaves gracefully transition from their vibrant green to their final stages before falling. The slopes of the mountain are blanketed with lush, deciduous trees where the bare branches add to the pockets of grey.
I achieved this imagery by focusing on the layered textures of tree branches. Layer upon layer, the colors form my goal of revealing the true essence of the mountains. In my personal way, I attempt to translate the scenery into a visually aesthetic language and express my curiosity for eternalness.
2022 NEW WORKS
The new paintings constantly encourage myself to explore the techniques, ideas and overall generate results that I feel proud of. While making these paintings, I was in a place where I wanted to create work that felt tranquil, serene and peaceful, and that’s exactly what I achieved.
To combine abstract and true-to-form representation, I experimented with different strokes to determine when to use brushstrokes for tighter applications to serve detail or looser applications to serve abstract moods. It’s a feeling where some parts feel more detailed and other parts evoke more emotion.
As a Charleston resident, I have always been fascinated by the mighty live oak trees dripping in Spanish moss, and I wanted to admire their natural beauty. Spanish moss is a flowering plant full of story. Known as “tree hair.”
In these paintings I focal on building the abstract shapes of the tone to contrast with the business of the fine details of the Spanish moss. The textures are prevalent, the differences tone of drapes, limbs rest on the ground, and the meadow meandered in the sunlight to distinguish the moss. I admire the shade that transformed the grass into a dappled hue, and together with the bright patches to form an image, they created the ever-changing mosaic of light and shade in the breeze.
I wanted to capture the feeling of a warm, sunny day on the river. The drapes of Spanish moss and composition are where I got caught up the most on this piece. The light reflecting from the water and the greens of the soft grass flattened under the wind in beautiful shimmering waves to reflect brilliant sunlight in the foreground.
It is my great honor to be a resident of the Lowcountry, as I am able to enjoy countless serene vistas: panorama view of beaches caressed by the Atlantic Ocean, live oak trees draped with Spanish Moss, creeks winding through the salt marshes, and the docks with pelicans resting on. The list goes on and on.
This painting depicts the flourishing vivid salt marshes with oak trees out in the blazing humidity. I was attracted to the shapes and colors of the live oak trees: branches adorned with light, clusters of twigs, gnarled and twisted, extend in the air like the arms of dancer. Although it was a cloudless Summer, I chose for the dramatic effect of very dark and busy leaves to contrast with the bright sky.
After a few days of break at the Appalachian Mountains, it began to snow right as we started to head home. Crystal flakes keep floating down from the cloudy skies and before we knew it, blankets of white coated the world. Beneath a silky layer of white, naked branches and evergreens shone through with an ethereal glow. Winter came with the lightest of carefree touches.
In these drawings, except for the general cheerful emotions and celebration of my autumn colors, it was interesting to me to transfer the transient nature of light and the spiritual effect it can create, while I depict the changing of the colors in the fall season against the light sky.
2021
Every year the mountain’s change to brown hue and the blissful colors brings us to a fading memory. In a unique and personal way, I try to capture the essence of the scene and commemorate the sensation eternally.
Along the Blue Ridge Parkway our eyes are awash with the multi-colored offerings of the trees, upon umber leaf, beneath cloud coddled skies, and the aroma of the fall that comes in earthen solemn grace. The brilliant shafts of sunlight caress the carpet of reds and golds before us, and each breath of the fresh air brings me a sense of life that almost makes my spirits soar beyond the colorful boughs above.Back in my studio I am eager to reimage the scene by simplifying the shapes and visualizing the lines and brilliant colors. I began the process by thinning the oil color and quickly blocking in the preliminary on a colored ground. Having built the defining main shape of composition, I stippled, splattered, and sponged the paint on the middle ground. Then I rendered the texture and detail in the foreground until I accomplished a satisfying image. During the process of building the layers, I captured the beautiful light and mood of a place and time while I orchestrated a melody. My goal is to create a painting that the viewer wants to walk into and lose themselves in the moment. Instead of depicting a particular location, I conveyed a certain mood.
2020
While a pack of egrets elegantly rested on the marshlands, a breeze blew softly, slightly rippling the water as it carried the heady scents of the plants through the air. This is a very typical scene of the wetlands.
Whenever I drive along the road of the low country and see the vast green expanses of marsh, I could feel myself relax and change, really appreciating this gift from nature.
The South marshland during the fall made quite an impression on me when I stood on the pier of the waterfront park in Charleston.
Inspired by the nature, I tried to capture the moment when the warmth from the sun reflected onto the grass and the dramatic, exciting sky and cloud formations. In the painting, I adjusted the lighter tones of the sky and the darker shadows of the grass to bring out the contrast. The smooth artworks gives a warm touch to the viewer's wall.
“The waves broke and spread their waters swiftly over the shore. One after another they massed themselves and fell; the spray tossed itself back with the energy of their fall. The waves were steeped deep-blue save for a pattern of diamond-pointed light on their backs which rippled as the backs of great horses ripple with muscles as they move. The waves fell; withdrew and fell again, like the thud of a great beast stamping.”
― Quote from Virginia Woolf, The Waves
Every time I walk on the beach, I am fascinated by the forming of the waves, so I established this series of paintings.
The Voices of Tides series based on the view of Isle of Palms beach, Charleston. These works emphasize the elements that form the waves I have found in the region: the quality of light, color-contrast, waterlines and natural flowing shapes of the waves. Each work in the series explores the way to build the texture of water.
2019
“We tend to think of landscapes as affecting us most strongly when we are in them or on them, when they offer us the primary sensations of touch and sight. But there are also the landscapes we bear with us in absentia, those places that live on in memory long after they have withdrawn in actuality, and such places -- retreated to most often when we are most remote from them -- are among the most important landscapes we possess.”
― Robert Macfarlane
2018
2017
