Text by Han Mihwa

This will be my second exhibition at Artland Gallery, following the 2018 exhibition of Han Misha + Sugimoto Ui.
I started creating abstract paintings after being fascinated by the works of Mark Rothko.

For the past several years, I have been familiar with Japanese wabi-sabi culture, Korean monochromatic paintings, and monochromatic ink painting, and have been influenced by the "blank spaces" and "pauses" found in these paintings. Therefore, I have been trying to create paintings without using colors as much as possible, but with rich emotions and textures.
I use acrylic, an easy-to-handle, contemporary painting medium, over fabric on panel as a support.

Due to the unprecedented corona disaster that began last year, things that had been taken for granted were no longer taken for granted, many things that I had planned to do disappeared, and my life was completely changed.
It gave me unexpected time, which had a great impact on my own production.

Perhaps because of the change in my state of mind under the uncertainty of not being able to see the future, I began to create monochrome works while at the same time gradually adding color to the screens I was creating.
I am now realizing that my life and my work are connected on a daily basis.

While my approach of creating works in the space between the artificial and the unconscious has not changed, I have been experimenting with various matiere, using different tools in place of brushes, and incorporating color into my work over the past year, as if on a journey with no fixed destination.

In this exhibition, I would like to show the process of my experiments through a solo exhibition.
I would be happy if I could share a little bit of openness and lightness through my works under the circumstances.

Han Mihwa

Miwha Han was born in Tokyo in 1976 as third-generation Korean living in Japan.
She graduated from the Department of Art, Korean University. And then she studied under Sei Arimori at U-Art Laboratory.
When she started to learn art, searching identity influenced her works. And then, she was impressed by Mark Rothko’s works and Antoni Tapies’s, she started to do abstract art with a strong desire to capture her inner thoughts on canvas.
After having a child at the age of 30, she changed the ways to create from oil-painting to liquid ink and acrylics. She was inspired by watercolor and Oriental paintings she had been familiar with since her childhood.
Such a way depending on eventuality and artificiality makes people feel sensitive and bold form and rich texture.
Because of her own way of using color with little decoration, her works are often commented as physical and musical and give you space.
Her works held in private collections in Japan, the United States and Germany.
And they’re displayed at hospitals and common use space of condominiums.
She has solo and group exhibitions in Japan and joins art fairs around the world.