Jewyo Rhii

b. 1971, born and based in Seoul, Korea.

Rhii studied at Ewha Womans University in Korea and continued her study at University of Pennsylvania and Chelsea College of Art & Design, UK. Rhii notes the contradictions of social structure among the physical discomforts and pain that are experienced in our daily lives. They are not ‘serious’ or ‘critical’ enough to raise upheavals to society, yet too intolerable to ignore. So the artist decides to reform the situations and discomforts from a personal level in a such a simple way as she makes a “comfort” tool or furniture with found objects. In this respect, her attention to the weak and vulnerable is subversive and constructive than any political fight.

Rhii takes her recent interest in the nature of memory and recollection of an object in the memory. What does it mean by having a memory of someone? What constitutes our memory of someone? Searching for the diverse information lost from memory or classified as ‘wrong’, she approaches from the outer edge of a memory. She especially catches the moment when misunderstandings and miscommunications in dialogues, or some words hidden in oblivion can suddenly produce unexpected encounter with the truth. Some trivial sound, breath, fragmented or unspoken word of someone can illuminate a clear memory of the person. Rhii is currently taking part in Rijksakademie van beeldende kunsten, Amsterdam, Netherlands.

- Jewyo Rhii, Moon Drawing, 2004, installation at Bilsar Binasi, Istanbul

- Jewyo Rhii, The Half Basement-Homage to Yiso Bahc, 2004, installation at Rijksakademic van beeldende kunsten,

- Amsterdam

- Jewyo Rhii, Ocean, ocean, 2004, pencil drawing on concrete wall, Rijksakademie van beeldende kunsten