I have long contemplated the question of what it means to see. The world of the senses lies before us, yet how honestly do we truly look at it? Or, can we even say that we are really seeing at all?
Observing the delicate, scale-like structures covering the wings of insects under a microscope became a turning point for me. It was not simply a matter of collecting images. On the wings of these small creatures stretched an entire universe: patterns, textures, fractures, repetitions, and the boundaries of disparate colors. Their compositional order was astonishingly precise—more complete than any artwork I had seen. Within it, I read stories of life and time, of disappearance and existence simultaneously.
This process of observation compelled me to rewrite the language of painting. What I now seek is not a painting of expression but a painting derived from looking. In other words, painting is not a tool for projecting my intentions, but a conduit for drawing out the small voices of the world. Between sensation and observation, between image and being, I grasp the subtle gaps and listen attentively to what they tell me. Painting emerges in this way—sensation activates, the gaze lingers, the hand responds, and the surface accumulates over time.
Throughout the act of painting, I am constantly aware of the gap between myself and the external world. That gap unsettles me, but it also provokes reflection. I become acutely conscious of the fragility of this world’s forms and of how indifferently humans pass them by. As a result, this body of work moves increasingly toward an ecological sensibility. What I observed was not merely the wing of a butterfly, but a reconfiguration of perception itself—a way of seeing the world. This perspective is inseparable from the climate crisis we now face. By unsettling human-centered systems of recognition, I wish to retell the largest of stories from the smallest of images.
The title of this series, Ma (間), comes from the East Asian philosophical concept of “ma,” meaning the interval or space between things—between time, space, and existence. Yet for me, ma is not just a concept, but a unit of sensation: a vibration arising at the edge of being. I respond to these subtle movements with painting. This gap is the very essence of perception I continue to explore, the site where my questions of existence linger. The unfamiliar life forms and spaces that evoke faint illusions are, for me, closer to an aperture—a fissure that sustains us. It is through such gaps that we come to understand ourselves and carefully cultivate our relationships with others.
As I continue living as a painter, I often feel that I am becoming less a seer than a responder. This response is not a matter of technical skill, but arises from concentration of the senses and an attitude toward existence. For this reason, the work has no end. Rarely do I feel a painting is truly finished; more often, a new microscopic world begins to open. That is why I continue to paint. Through painting, I read the textures of the world anew, renew my own inner being, and reestablish the center of my perception.