Youngseok Cha’s : Well Still Life

At first glance, Youngseok Cha’s drawings appear a bit like oversized doodles, the sort we all used to make back in school while sitting through the most boring classes. But then, you take a closer look and become aware of the intricate level of detail in these depictions, you begin to see there is a determination, a formal commitment and instantly realize that they are anything but doodles. Spread out evenly across large sheets of paper is a visual feast, scores of figures of varying sizes meticulously and beautifully drawn in pencil, a rare and genuine treasure trove for the eyes to feast on.

You naturally try to read them, try to understand what these figures are and what do they all mean? There are porcelain jars with intricate dragon motifs, old oriental vases with flowers interspersed with a varieties of cactus plants and miniature bonsai trees next to what appear to be sliced deer antlers. But wait, the closer you look the more you discover. There are old toy pistols, Russian Matryoshka dolls, traditional Chinese toy dolls, Disney characters, ornate pincushion boxes, branches with leaves and musical snow-globes. You start to take fancy to some of these, they inevitably remind you of your childhood, its an unavoidable identification which, as a matter of course, evokes a sense of nostalgia.

There are conch shells and starfish from beach outings and pins and insects too. Well, sometimes it is not evident if the beetles are preserved specimens after a field trip or whether they are meant to be alive and roaming amongst the objects depicted, it is supposed to be after all, a still life drawing. But if you look very carefully you might just catch a glimpse of un-still action, there are two beetles copulating in a flower pot, a touch of humour amidst the seriousness.

A plethora of mystical and mysterious objects are also to be found. Buddha statues, Christian crosses, Taoist fans and other religious artifacts, not to mention a model of a human skeleton, snake plants, medicinal herbs, pills and other obscure items.

Seemingly unrelated paraphernalia, a veritable cornucopia of whimsical and curious trinkets. These drawings could well be representations of objects in the artist’s possession or they might just as easily represent things from his memories. Either way, they exist here because they hold meaning, thus they become symbols, metaphors and perhaps only the artist knows what secrets are hidden within each one of them, a puzzle for the viewer to decode.

There is no narrative per se, perhaps mere evidence that the artist has a penchant for collecting. This is a systematic inventory list of sentimental items, hobbies and keepsakes, mementos and souvenirs. It is obvious that they are catalogued here and drawn in such a delicate and dainty way only because the author loves these things, each one of them must carry personal meaning, a memory or a story.

Upon examining several of Cha’s drawings, it becomes evident that there is a pattern, that his choice of objects and their arrangement is consistent and very deliberate. They form compound arrangements, not unlike the contents of a cabinet of curiosities laid out and illustrated on paper.  From a strictly formal view, one would have to agree that this is an unusual way to draw a still life picture. There are no backgrounds, no table tops or surfaces of any kind on which the items are normally placed. They are simply drawn against the plain background of the paper. They form no shadows against the background and as a whole, they do not follow a linear perspective. It is therefore, not possible for the viewer to discern distance based on the size of the items. They are positioned randomly on the paper, in varying  sizes regardless of position, some large, some very small.

The most interesting and curious fact is that although each item is not drawn in a way to contribute to an overall perspective, the individual items are actually drawn in differing perspectives. Some of the items are drawn in a three dimensional perspective, with shading that suggests a direction of light, and an orthogonal angle of viewing. Although there are several items drawn in this way, they don’t all follow the same direction of light and shadow. Even more interesting is that some of the items are drawn using an isometric projection which hints at their three dimensionality by having one axis foreshortened, suggesting a top angle of view such that the items do not appear to extend closer or away from the viewer. This perceived distortion is even more exaggerated by some of the objects, such as some vases that are drawn with their mouths facing towards the viewer instead of upwards. This fact opens up the question of whether Cha’s, work is informed by western surrealism.

The visual ambivalence that is created through this play on distortion, as well as the overall arrangement of the represented objects suggests that the artist is not simply creating a still life drawing but something more complex, he is creating a synthesis from a list of well known and instantly recognizable shapes or components. A synthesis which becomes a sort of visual language of types. In fact, Youngseok Cha draws objects that people collect but it can be said that many of the objects represented could be viewed as stereotypical cultural artifacts, Jungian archetypes that exit in the collective unconscious.

Evangelo Costadimas for Gallery on Old Bailey, September 2010