Art in the Middle: From Silent Horizons to Swirling Reveries
Nestled in the heart of Seoul’s creative circuit, Art in the Middle curated by KPLUS at Artbooth offered a moment of quiet revelation—where stillness, solitude, and sensation converge. We found ourself emotionally entangled in the poetic range of artworks by Shin Woojae, Kang Seungyoon, and Angelina Danilova.
Shin Woojae’s Dreamlike Bloom
Stepping into Shin Woojae’s painterly world was like floating through a celestial fog. His canvases are large, tranquil fields of soft washes—pale jade greens, powdery blues, misty yellows—seeping like memories into the paper’s fibers. He doesn’t paint as much as he lets pigment breathe and bloom, leaving behind marks that resemble nature’s silent formations: coral reefs, frost, or moss under light. In mood and materiality, it evokes the meditative calm of Claude Monet’s Water Lilies but stripped of form—closer to the subconscious, perhaps even the afterimage of a dream.
The yellow speckles dancing in his darker compositions shimmer like falling pollen or stardust. Up close, the paper wrinkles and textures add another dimension—a tactile feeling of fragility and time passing. In the gallery’s quiet, these pieces whisper.
Kang Seungyoon’s Solitude in Black and White
In a striking contrast, Kang Seungyoon’s monochromatic photography taps into something existential. A broken chair balanced against the ocean, a pair of worn pedestrian symbols on asphalt, birds suspended in flight—these photographs aren’t just documentation; they’re quiet poems of absence.
His perspective reminds me of the works of Hiroshi Sugimoto or Rinko Kawauchi’s more somber moments, where light and void speak louder than figures. The photograph of the chair on volcanic rocks facing the ocean moved me unexpectedly. It is so simple, yet so weighted with loneliness, memory, and silence. You could sit there in your mind and stare forever. Even the birds, frozen mid-air, seem to yearn for something beyond the frame.
Angelina Danilova’s Visual Crescendo
Then came the surreal energy of Angelina Danilova’s work—vibrant, theatrical, and filled with expressive movement. Swirling tendrils of color—turquoise, lavender, pearlescent whites—twist like silk in water or smoke in a dream. The works pulse with a kind of feminine force, a blooming vitality, almost as if they’re choreographed on canvas.
Her visual language feels contemporary but references the elegance of Art Nouveau curves, Danilova modernizes it—her palette is clean, her strokes bold, and her forms glowing with a synthetic sheen. Her art hits you instantly—bold and unapologetically luminous.
Each artist in Art in the Middle speaks a different language—Woojae whispers, Seungyoon pauses, and Danilova sings. But together, they form a hauntingly beautiful conversation about space, sensation, and emotion.
This is not a show you scroll past online. You have to be in the room—to feel the weight of silence, the fluidity of pigment, the vibration of color. It reminds us why art should still be seen in person.
Exhibition: Art in the Middle
Venue: Artbooth Seoul, in collaboration with KPLUS.
📸 Photos by Vily Magazine.
