Ever on the lookout for work by Korean artists, LKL visited Broomhill Art Hotel, between Barnstaple and Ilfracombe in North Devon, last week. It was kind of on the way home from a family holiday in North Cornwall – a one-hour detour off the main route, plus a pleasant hour or so browsing around an exhibition, followed by a coffee to prepare one for the assault on the A303.
Broomhill is hosting its National Sculpture Prize, an annual event that it has promoted since 2009, set in its picturesque grounds in a sheltered valley. The competition promotes up and coming sculptors, and one of its features is that the public are invited to vote for their favourite work and help to select a winner.
One of the finalists is Sungfeel Yun, who has been a regular exhibitor in London over past couple of years, studying at Goldsmiths for his BA, and then at the Slade for his MFA. His Slade degree show was held earlier this year.
Yun explains his work as follows:
My work is about the nature of existence, as explored and explained by Eastern philosophies and the theories of universal physics. My fascination wtih this subject began with my painful episodes of bronchial asthma attacks during my childhood.
In these moments of panic, I became preoccupied with ontological questions. The deceptively simple “What am I?” has always interested me since then, and this is the starting point for my works as well as the main theme.
The publicity shot you will find on the Broomhill Art Hotel website (reproduced at the top of this page) was obviously taken before the summer growth of sundry wildflowers. On my visit last week the meadow had matured rather nicely, meaning that you had to hunt quite hard to find some of the works. But being made out of nice shiny steel Yun’s work caught the eye as you walked down the shady path to the exhibition area (see above). Here are some of my shots (click on the thumbnails lower down for a slideshow). Apologies for the poor quality – I managed to leave my camera at home so these were taken with the mobile phone.
You can vote for Yun’s work here:
http://www.broomhillart.co.uk/national-sculpture-prize/your-vote.html
I don’t want to be disloyal, but if I were a betting man my money would be on Dorcas Casey’s Familiar for the popular vote:
But don’t hold back. Vote early, vote often.