Artists: Aidan Duffy and Jonghwan Lee
Venue: CYLINDER, Seoul, South Korea and South Parade, London, UK
Date: June 26 – August 3, 2024
Photography: ©Corey Bartle-Sanderson / all images copyright and courtesy of the artists and South Parade, London
Note: Exhibition floor plan is available here
CYLINDER (Seoul) and South Parade (London) are delighted to present a collaborative exhibition with Aidan Duffy and Jonghwan Lee.
Aidan Duffy creates sculptures of rich texture, shape and structure that combine and fuse the natural and the synthetic; the organic and inorganic. He collects and uses an intriguing range of natural and industrially made materials: stone or driftwood, electrics, metals, furniture and other discarded or found objects. Sometimes materials lie in the studio for months before they are incorporated into a work – movement and making precipitated by a sudden intuition. But the process is not haphazard, there is control and precision. Initial drawings serve as a fluid departure for his studio practice – line and colour leading to compositional armatures of metals, jesmonite and resin with sprinkled pigment: form indivisible from colour.
Duffy’s sculptural syntax goes beyond definition, spanning the fine and decorative arts as well as domestic functionality. Despite the seemingly fortuitous way in which the material is found and made, these sculptures have a unity and coherence of form and meaning; suggesting a harmony between the body and the environment; and this, in turn, demonstrates the vulnerability and resilience of the world in which we live.
Jonghwan Lee’s paintings delve into the condensed world of painting materials that exist within the continuously forming cyclical structure of ‘perception’ and how such perception of painting conjures a sense of vitality for the viewer.
Thinking through painting as connected textural planes and sculptural framing forms, he aims to unravel the dimensions and sensations that arise from the interconnectedness between the two. Lee’s paintings reside between the boundaries of two-dimensional and three-dimensional. Landscapes gradually transitioned into solid surfaces through casting, facilitated by chemical reactions between water and white powder. The gypsum transforms into another three-dimensional object connected to the panel from which it originated.
Jonghwan Lee (b.1994, South Korea) studied at Korea National University of Arts, gaining a MFA in Fine Art, Seoul, and studied previously at Seoul National University, graduating with a BFA in Oriental Painting in 2021. Recent solo exhibitions include HYBERCUBE, CYLINDER TWO, Seoul (South Korea, 2023); Cabinet, Sahng-up Gallery, Seoul (South Korea, 2023); FILCH, JUST, JELLY, PROJECT ROOM SINPO, Incheon (South Korea, 2020). Group shows include The Good Neighbour, Art Space 3, Seoul (South Korea, 2023); Waiting Room, Suchi, Seoul (South Korea, 2022); Perigee Winter Show, Perigee Gallery, Seoul (South Korea, 2022); The Wild Bunch, ThisWeekendRoom, Seoul (South Korea, 2022); Fonds, Osisun, Seoul (South Korea, 2022); Room of Convexity and Concavity, La La & Seoul (South Korea, 2022) and TORQUE 1 / GEAR SHIFT, CYLINDER ONE, Seoul (South Korea, 2021). Lee has exhibited at art fairs including PACK.FAIR.2023, Seoul (South Korea, 2023); Drawing Attention, Seoul (South Korea, 2023); ART BUSAN 2023, Busan (South Korea, 2023) and The Preview Seongsu 2022, Seoul (South Korea, 2022). Lee will be exhibiting at Frieze Seoul Focus Asia this September 2024.
Aidan Duffy (b. 1995 in Glasgow, Scotland) lives and works in London, having grown up between Glasgow and the Scottish Highlands. Recent solo exhibitions/presentations include After the Function, 243 Luz, Margate (UK, 2023), Art-O-Rama (with South Parade), Marseille (France, 2023) and young coin rite, South Parade, London (UK, 2023). Recent selected group exhibitions include The Unlimited Dream Company II, Hannah Barry, London (UK, 2023), Raw Nerves, Hannah Barry, London (UK, 2022), My Empty Shell, Ambrosia Projects, London (UK, 2022), The Room, South Parade, London (UK, 2022); Grotto, Ridley Road Project Space, London (UK, 2022), Sole, curated by Rebecca Ackroyd, Becky’s Unit, London (UK, 2020), Fashion Cafe, Kantine, Brussels (Belgium, 2019), and Motte + Bailey, St. James Road, London (UK, 2019). Duffy also contributes to various publications, such as the virtual magazine Bog.
