Lot 1604: YOO SEUNG HO

YOO SEUNG HO
(b. 1973)
Yodeleheeyoo
signed in Korean (upper left); signed, titled, dated and inscribed 'YOO SEUNG-HO; yodeleheeyoo!; 2005; up' in English (on the reverse)
pen on paper mounted on panel
163 x 122 cm. (64 1/8 x 48 in.)
Painted in 2005

Tokyo, Japan, Mori Art Museum, The Elegance of Silence, 29 March-19 June, 2005.
Seoul, Korea, CAIS Gallery, Jie Dao Sha Ren Zhi Ji, 2006.

By exploring our relationship to and understanding of the materiality of words, the effect of dialogue becomes environmental, entering our mind and building an innate image of its definition. As Yoo Seung Ho demonstrates the potential material qualities of a language and its pictorial process in our mind, he applies this logic to reconstructions of the traditional landscape by exposing his linguistic structure of materials and nature by pronouncing strings of words that epitomize the definition of traditional Oriental paintings.

As his words 'yodeleheeyoo' echoes within the isolation of the white, empty canvas, it is clear that oriental painting as his basic silhouette is one that was heavily contemplated by Yoo for his theoretical deliverance. A calligraphic character of Yoo's own handwriting spells the horizon and altitude of its location, reverberating against the simplicity of his black and white and immaterialist medium. The hills situated high above the clouds are intricate and neat in its textural definition; such high contrast between distinctive patterns and the emptiness of the background metaphorically reflects his acute command of typography as he knowingly extracts the parallel significance of visual contrast between the texts and its surrounding space, matching it to the abstract qualities of oriental paintings. Contouring an image of a landscape that he decidedly visualizes with his consumption of the word 'yodeleheeyoo', he imitates the notion of traditional painting as the landscape of the mind, inducing the viewer to enter more deeply into the experience of the painting, as if ascending to the crest of the mountain ridge beneath, while hearing the sound of this enthusiastic shout, expressing in lively fashion the artist's sense of free and unrestrained pleasure and satisfaction.