Click an image to view the caption for each artwork.
Ma 25-Ⅺ-25, Oil and water-based pigment on linen, 178 × 127 cm (70 × 50 in), 2025.
Ma 24-Ⅺ-25, Oil and water-based pigment on linen, 178 × 127 cm (70 × 50 in), 2025.
Ma 16-Ⅸ-25 Oil and water-based pigment on linen 178 × 127 cm (70 × 50 in.), 2025.
Ma 16-Ⅸ-25 Oil and water-based pigment on linen 178 × 127 cm (70 × 50 in.), 2025.
Ma 26-VII-25 Oil and water-based pigment on linen 44 × 33 cm (17.3 × 13 in), 2025.
Ma 28-VII-25 Oil on linen, 50 × 50 cm (19.7 × 19.7 in.), 2025
Ma 14-VIII-25 Oil and water-based pigment on linen 178 × 127 cm (70 × 50 in.), 2025.
Ma 16-V-25 Oil and water-based pigment on linen 178 × 127 cm (70 × 50 in.), 2025.
Ma 04-I-25 Oil and water-based pigment on linen 178 × 127 cm (70 × 50 in.), 2025.
Ma 26-Ⅱ-25 Oil and water-based pigment on linen 178 × 127 cm (70 × 50 in.), 2025.
Delayed Gaze: On the Material Surface and the Perceptual Interstice (Ma) (2026)
My work begins with a fundamental question: How do we see?
Within a contemporary visual culture in which images are converted into data and consumed at the speed of light, I believe painting must paradoxically reveal its own physical body in order to function as a “decelerator” that holds the viewer’s gaze. I am investigating painterly devices that encourage viewers to remain before the surface a little longer—conditions for what I call a delayed gaze.
Within a contemporary visual culture in which images are converted into data and consumed at the speed of light, I believe painting must paradoxically reveal its own physical body in order to function as a “decelerator” that holds the viewer’s gaze. I am investigating painterly devices that encourage viewers to remain before the surface a little longer—conditions for what I call a delayed gaze.
For me, painting is not mere decoration but a medium that awakens the viewer’s bodily senses. I seek to move beyond “optical vision,” in which the viewer observes from a distance in order to grasp form, toward an experience of haptic visuality, where vision and touch intersect through close engagement with texture.
In recent works, fine hair-like strokes and raised layers of paint embody this intention. The trajectories of brushwork and the material density of the surface stimulate the somatosensory cortex, prompting the brain to simulate tactile sensation even without physical contact.
Within this process emerges what I describe as retroactive imagination—the act of tracing the artist’s bodily gestures through the visible residues on the surface. This reverse tracking heightens the emotional density between viewer and artwork and physically prolongs the duration of the gaze.
In my work, the concept of Ma extends beyond physical emptiness. It signifies an interstice—both a connection and a rupture—where presence is concealed yet simultaneously emerges. By covering the surface or dispersing paint into particulate flows, I intentionally render forms opaque. Such concealment destabilizes the authority of the gaze. The viewer is placed before cognitive uncertainty, unable to grasp the image at a glance, and the brain expends additional energy attempting to decode what remains incomplete.
In particular, the work featuring two dark apertures embedded within a green surface activates the human instinct of pareidolia, compelling the viewer to confront what appears to be a gaze within the painting itself. This encounter produces a powerful cognitive fixation, as the act of looking is reversed and the viewer becomes aware of being looked at.
Ultimately, my paintings do not present an object to be seen; they reveal the very conditions under which vision is formed. Through carefully orchestrated chromatic contrasts and discontinuities of texture, I guide the viewer’s eye to circulate rhythmically across the surface.
This experience restores fragmented contemporary attention and reconnects the viewer with the material wonder that lies beneath smooth digital imagery. For me, painting is not a static plane but a continuously vibrating perceptual event. It is completed only when the viewer discovers their own memories and sensations within the interstices of the surface
