도올 김용옥 교수의 딸, 김미루씨 전시 리뷰

 

올블랙으로 차려입고 온 김미루씨는 조용조용하셨어요.

뭔가 신비한 분위기?!

완젼 열정적으로 강의하시는 아버지와는 또 다른 ^-^;

다들 누드 사진전이네.. 김용옥의 딸이네..하면서 주목하지만,

작품 자체만으로도 충분히 주목할만한 작가인 것 같습니다.

 

 

Naked photographer dissects city

 

It was about a quarter past 3 a.m. when Kim Miru, 27, slid down from one of the top peaks of the Manhattan Bridge in New York, United States, hair loose and naked. A friend of hers pressed on the shutter of the camera which Kim had installed at another of the bridge's summits. Helicopters soon approached, flashing lights at Kim. Someone must have called the police. "How in the world did she get up there" was probably the question the New York police asked at the time, as did anyone who later saw that night's unbelievable photo. Kim's answer was simple. "I just climbed up," Kim, wearing a droopy black dress and smoky eye makeup, told the awestruck press last week. "I wanted to see the view from up there. I figured that since not so many people have been there, the view would be very unique." This "brave" Korean photographer is holding her solo exhibition "Naked City Spleen" at Gallery Hyundai Gangnam Space in southern Seoul. Although she is already quite well-known for her experimental works in the United States, this is Kim's first show in Korea. And looking at the response from the local media, it looks like Kim has achieved fame on her first try here. In addition to her talent, she is well-placed. She is the daughter of Kim Yong-ok, a celebrity professor of oriental philosophy. "He said that he liked my works because they contain thoughts," the photographer said, sparing words. After seeing them, however, and knowing her passion for them, it becomes clear that Kim is worth being valued as an individual artist, not someone's daughter. The former pre-med student, who wanted to become a surgeon due to her interest in anatomy, decided to dissect cities instead and shifted her career to become an artist. After majoring in French and Romance Philology at Columbia University, she earned a Master of Fine Arts in painting at Pratt Institute. At this exhibition, Kim is displaying about 50 photos that feature her adventures as an "urban explorer," one who explores the urban ruins hidden below and above the city, which most people are unfamiliar with. Ultimately, rats led her to the internet-based community of urban explorers. "I always liked rats, and I was at the subway trying to photograph them when a man came up to me and said I can't take pictures there. So I decided to follow the rats. There, I realized that there was a whole new dimension to the city I never saw before and most people don't get to see. Around the same time I found about the urban explorers through the internet," Kim said. Since then, Kim explored hidden spaces in world's major cities, often alone and sometimes with one or two friends but always with a camera in hand. She crawled into countless tunnels, squeezed in between the narrow walls of abandoned factories, lied down in ossuaries and climbed up wobbling towers. The adventures had to take place late at night or early in the morning because first, she did not want to get caught by the police and cause trouble, and second, she had to appear in her photos, in nudity. "Simply documenting these soon to be demolished structures wasn't enough for me. So I wanted to create a fictional character or an animal that dwelled in these spaces and the simplest way to do it was to model myself. I decided against clothing because I wanted the animal to be without any cultural implications or time specific elements," said Kim. Her body in the photos does not look erotic at all but rather curious, miserable and lonely, like the last surviving animal of its kind. The exhibition runs through Sept. 13 at Gallery Hyundai Gangnam Space in Sinsa-dong, southern Seoul. For more information, visit www.galleryhyundai.com or call (02) 519-0800. (claire@heraldm.com) By Park Min-young