[1] The roots of memory

“My search for the roots of memory was initiated by a desire to catch time”

Lee Leenam has so far worked on looking for his roots. We are living on a continuous line of life and time as if we are short joints and tiny dots. If these joints of each individual’s life are connected, we might discover some cosmic time through the roots of mankind. In this light, Lee borrows some time held in paintings through an appropriation of classical paintings. A new space and time are formed by digitally linking the time each painting bears. That is, he seems to believe that he could borrow a time from the future by grafting a time from the past onto the present.

This exhibition appropriates the artist’s time that slipped by. It contemplates his physical information, the roots of his spirit, and the origin of his art by mapping his memory of the words he said in 1980 when he was in fifth grade onto the present. He is obsessed with these memories because time still passes and vanishes. Time can be violent. What can be eternal within the irresistible violence of time that constantly extinguishes itself? Where are my existence and memory going? Does the truth exist on earth? Lee explores eternity and truth by lighting up disappearing time.

[2] The exhibit of memory

“The door to fifth grader Lee Leenam’s memory is in G.MAP.”

Lee sets a physical space in G.MAP as a spot to connect to time of the past. He makes a hidden door to one’s memory like the 7 ½ floor in the film Being John Malkovich. This enables the artist to have a conversation with his self by entering into himself in the past.

The line blurs between subject and object: that is the point where the subject becomes the object and vice versa. This is an expansion of the oneness of the physical world and the spiritual world in Eastern aesthetics.

Expanding the notion of landscapes

Unlike Western landscape painting, Eastern landscape painting relies on the idea that the subject is one and the same as the object. Lee has the exhibit space that becomes one with the audience by expanding this concept of oneness of the physical and spiritual world or the oneness of the ego and the outside world. The space of fifth grader Lee Leenam is not only a nexus where the artist meets himself in the past but also the space where he shares his memories with others.

[3] The memories of a fifth grader

“I often dreamed of dying at that time.”

Lee Leenam often dreamed of his death when he was a fifth grader. He seemed to be overly conscious of death. Lee exhibits these feelings and memories, specifying the year 1980 when he was a fifth grader. His fragmentary memories of everyday life including scenes of Damyang and his memories of his father and mother are fused with images of plays, athletic events, and festivals in this exhibition. He also demonstrates the relation between reality, dream, and memory couched in his unique visual idioms, likening this to that which is between substance and its shadow. His works on show at this exhibition are also a representation of his latent memories with objects conveying horror and legends.

[4] The shadow of shimmering light: The discovery of a substantial image in the shadow of play

Lee stages images that seem derived from plays, athletic events, and festivals, setting himself as a fifth grader. He hides inner shadows someone may discover in images of a galanty show a child statue, a girl reading a book, mobiles, lullabies, and reading meetings. A galanty show highlighting a kid carrying a torch in his hand in a colorful space looks like a play, but you can find the shadow of troops taking aim at citizens from electric fans aligned in straight rows. He allows viewers to discover hidden images and to associate them with their memories by putting ambivalent images of play and death in each work. It is thought that someone’s memory will be connected and expanded through the memory of Lee Leenam (a fifth grader).