Seoul, b. unknown

Kwon, Soon-young (b. 1975) majored in Oriental Painting in Dankook University (B.F.A) and Hongik University (M.F.A). She held a number of solo exhibitions including The Land of Ghosts (The SoSo, 2023), A Journey of tears (Gallery SoSo, 2017), the milk of sorrow (Gallery FACTORY, 2014), Flashback (Kwanhoon gallery, 2007), and participated in group exhibitions such as The SoSo special (The SoSo, 2022), CHILDREN CROSSING THE NIGHT (Seoul National University Museum of Art, 2022), The Adventures of Korean Painting: I Will Go Away All by Myself (National Museum of Modern and Contemporary Art Cheongju, 2019), STILL ACTS (Art Sonje Center, 2016), Journey to a fluid Island (Kumho Museum of Art, 2016). Selected for the grant program of Korea Arts Management Service Center, Kwon has been a special artist representing Gallery SoSo since 2022. Kwon, Soon-young has been creating her own world of cruel fairy tales with characters representing young beings in agony. (···) Kwon’s work is not about the fantasy itself, which evaporates in an instant, but instead focuses on innocent characters who console the harsh reality, those who await it even though it will only end in vain. Their naïve wishes, endlessly delayed and never coming true in reality, evolve into more powerful fantasies in the artist’s imagination, and with it, the pain in real life gets worse with their ever-growing anticipation. Because the fantasy created by Kwon is inseparable from reality, the more beautiful and gloomy it is, the more pitiful it gets. – excerpted from Eunju Lee, “Fantasy of sympathy and console”