Looking back at the 2010 Geumgang Nature Art Biennale Yatoo Workshop / 2010

Looking back at the 2010 Geumgang Nature Art Biennale Yatoo Workshop

Where is your mind?

Jeon, Wong-gil , Artist/Curator of 2010 Geumgang Nature Art Biennale

 

 

1. Prologue

2010 Geumgang Nature Art Biennale's Yatoo Workshop was held for the second time, succeeding the past 2008 Biennale. Yatoo Workshop which was planned in order to share Yatoo's spirit of nature art movement with the Biennale's participating artists, was held for two days from September 2nd to 3rd, 2010 during the production period of Biennale's artwork at the Yatoo

 

house of Nature art located in Wongol, Dongwon-li, Shinpung-myeon, Gongju city. 

Even though the period was short and it was the first Workshop for the artists to participate, they showed a variant and fine works as artists who have been long working inside nature. At first, I had planned to pick only good works and edit them together on the page that introduces Biennale's exhibition works. However, all works of participating artists were great that I could not leave even one behind and reflecting the opinion that it should be treated more importantly when considering the importance of Nature Art Workshop, I came to introduce all works of artists who participated in the Workshop along with the essays they sent me.

Through this essay, I wish to go a step further than just to introduce the works of Yatoo Workshop and make it an opportunity to understand the characteristic of Yatoo's works through counter-arguments towards critical opinions regarding Yatoo's work that were suggested during the Workshop period. Next, I would like to deliver the atmosphere of Yatoo by introducing the two days' Yatoo Workshop as to sketch it. Lastly, in terms of introducing the works of artists, I will show the description of works that the artists sent and review of Yatoo Workshop together. I believe that it will deliver nurture artists as well as their works more vividly.

 

 

2. Critical opinions toward Yatoo's methodology

 

The day before I started Yatoo Workshop, I introduced Yatoo's spirit and its methodology to foreign participating artists. The simple abbreviation of the contents of that introduction is as the following.

“Yatoo members have been trying to find the spot where nature and people's artistic desire will hit the balance within nature. In other words, the important characteristic of Yatoo's work is not to change nature as much as possible and to express human's thoughts along with nature. Yatoo's artists like to go into nature without any preparations for work, only with empty body and soul and to work on the basis of the inspiration that nature throws to them. Their works are often consisted of subdued actions that use one's body, or from natural subjects they come across unexpectedly. Since Yatoo's works are accomplished through a minimum action, installation and simple drawing, there are not many people who actually have seen it at the site. Yatoo's works where basic daily actions such as piling, connecting, drawing, inserting, throwing etc soon become the method of artwork inside nature have an attraction that arouses viewers not to stay as audience, and to have a positive mind for them to give it a try."

I insisted that Yatoo's nature art movement which spontaneously started in a small local city in Korea was a new attempt that deviates from arts of other countries that are accomplished inside nature such as land art, environmental art, eco-art, site specific art, etc.

Regarding my opinion, there have been counter-arguments and discussions from a number of artists. One question among them was, what the difference of Yatoo is, with the works of Andy Goldsworthy of England who use natural objects. Andy Goldsworthy is the artist who has been long working only with natural objects that he found in nature and not using artificial materials. In comparison with Yatoo's artists who use drawing equipments that are not natural objects or partially artificial equipments, he works, using natural objects almost with bare hands. Amazing concentration, completion of work and the photographs that are well taken have earned a sympathy of many people to evoke a large amount of echo in Europe since 1980s. When I first acquainted with his work (around 1980s), I also was surprised by the similarity with Yatoo's work and was overwhelmed by his beautiful work.

Andy Goldsworthy must have had no idea that the artists in Korea of the similar age as him, would be working with natural objects inside nature but not even one member from Yatoo in 1980s had ever seen Andy Goldsworthy's works. The fact is undeniably interesting that works that differ from the established Nature art were being created in England and Korea at that time. However, despite many similarities to have started to leave many works by using natural objects during the similar period, there don't seem to be many people who are aware of the fact that differences exist between works of Andy Goldsworthy and Yatoo, in terms of the attitude towards nature or results. Andy Goldsworthy makes a very good use of natural object that he found inside nature, to coincide with the result he wants. Even though he does not use natural objects by processing them, he treats natural objects as materials. As in using leaves instead of paints, he does pictorial expressions and by using wood, stone, or ice, etc, he produces sculptural results.

Yatoo artists do not use nature just as a material. There is a difference between members, but they know the way to change pure nature to artistic status. Most works are conceptual rather than visual. Instead of delivering a clear meaning, it reflects a poetic immediacy. Since Yatoo's works are not detached from nature and connected to art or overlapped transparently, they do not largely change the visual landscape of the site. Also, through the process of touching one's hand or body with nature, it generates an artistic meaning. It should not be overlooked that if Andy Goldsworthy's works disappear as time passes, there are many works of Yatoo that show a behavioral aspect as to disappear at the moment the artist moves with his/her hand or leaves the spot.

The second question that touched the core of Yatoo's work was the following. They are not exact words that he said but to abbreviate in general, "Yatoo's works seem to be little children's play. They are works that can be done very simply without deep thoughts and efforts. Yatoo's works seem to be similar to a simple journal type and it may be one start to a serious work of a bigger scale. It seems like only a photograph work or material and it does not seem to be a serious art work."

I think that this artist's opinion was an important question which told us what he saw and felt, without any prejudice. The parts that he pointed out can be a disadvantage if viewed with a traditional aspect that had been established, but if viewed from a different aspect, it can be an advantage which can lead modern art to a drastically new domain.

Even though Yatoo's young members in early 1980s knew what to do in order to advance to artistic world and succeed, they worked in a drastically different method from what they learned in art college.

According to one member's retrospect, "I wondered something like this can be an art." Likewise, they worked inside nature half in doubt at first, and treated nature as a place to put one's work but gradually, they got to take a method to accept nature inside one's work. Deviating from the attitude to make something or show something, we worked to eventually put a bigger meaning into the communication itself with nature. Also, rather than to throw something that one planned into nature, the change of location has taken place that is to work with something that is given from nature. Such change of location did not simply stop at the problem of mental attitude and has revealed to be the aspect of work. When nature had been a tool for one artwork until the past, it has become a true nature that operates inside the artworks. While human's action is subdued as much is possible, we worked to make the nature to be revealed as it is. Yatoo's work now finally came to be seen as nothing had been done. Standing in the road where no one pulls, Yatoo members worked while moving along the inspiration that comes from nature and they finally got to stand in the contact point between nature and art.

Likewise, Yatoo's works have a range of evolutionary process in terms of acquiring their own methods to express alongside nature. It is to work on the base that clearly acknowledges oneself as an artist and it is not done in a one sided dimension like children's play. If a gesture of an innocent child is felt from Yatoo's works, it is an advantage and not something to be criticized about.

If someone tries to find a result of a crafty effort, it is often not found in Yatoo's works. However, if one can see nature that an artist instructs at the last moment when humans' intentional artistic action is all gone, one will meet the living nature that acts within an artwork. Nevertheless, viewers' attention does not completely leave the artwork. Without the expression equipment of an artist such as a simple drawing, installation or action, the meeting with that nature becomes not an artistic thing but an everyday matter.

The story that Yatoo's works will only have a meaning as a start for a more full-scale work must mean that themselves are not equipped with a condition as artworks. I think that he said something that is hard to say, if he is not an artist who considers only the crafty completion as an artistic value. Among Yatoo's work, there are good work and not good work. However, if an artist accepts that artwork to oneself, that is an independent work as itself.

I think that Yatoo's Workshop shows a new possibility of 'doing art' Even though that Yatoo members have not been working anonymously, there was a mutual understanding that each work was an outcome of nature rather than something from themselves. I think that such attitude differ from the creation attitude of contemporary artists where individual's existence value is maximized and dent in each of their private story. Especially when Yatoo's nature art methodology was being formed around early and mid 1980s, I remember that such attitude was vividly there through the experience at Yatoo's site. It is to view the possibility of individual liberation which can let someone hear the artistic meeting of nature which is all humankind's universal base of life and human that lives inside that as a beautiful chorus.

Most works of Yatoo Four Season's Research Society disappear at the site right away. In most cases, one cannot meet that works unless on photographs. Sometimes, photographs deliver artists' intention more clearly than reality. In that sense, how thankful medium are photographs? The thought that photographs cannot be artworks does not mix with the concept of art of this era that has been enlarged. If someone says that only originals that are left in detail are artworks, the artistic possibility that expresses various aspects of this world will be largely limited.

I felt sorry that we were not able to have enough discussion back then, regarding the questions that were asked during the process of the presentation so I organized and wrote down my thoughts. If chances allow, I expect active statements and discussions about Nature art will be accomplished, through the counter-arguments from artists.

I thank the artists who gave me good questions and opinions.

 

 

3. The site of Yatoo Workshop

Since there often have been rainy days which made artists busy in terms of work schedule, artists do not seem to feel so inclined to participate in Workshop. With a little bit worried mind, I left for the house of nature art in Wongol. Since Yatoo Workshop was to meet nature with an empty hand and mind, I made up my mind to empty my mind and spend the comfortable time better than anyone else since I was the curator.

After arriving at the house of nature art in Wongol and finishing a simple guide regarding the process schedule of nature art Workshop, I unpacked at the wide hall in the first floor. Due to the very hot weather, everyone did not feel easy to move their body. As always, time is necessary. Body will move when mind moves so waiting takes place until the nature call them out. So far, Yatoo's Four Seasons Workshop has offered me an atmosphere to meet with nature. I get to have a totally different mind from when I walk by myself in daily life and didn't nature approach us through Four Season's Workshop as to confess her intention? We certainly will see a gem of artworks in Yatoo Summer Workshop in September 3rd, 2010 which will welcome its 119th opening.

The first artwork of this Biennale's Workshop came from Patrick Tagoe-Turkson, an artist from Ghana. The performance that is consisted of an active gesture which mates a body to an X shaped laundry pillar in a courtyard was connected to a mutual work with Pawel from Poland. Through this Workshop, he showed the most active aspects.

 

Patrick Tagoe-Turkson

 

I came out of the house of nature art and worked while walking the farm road towards mountain side with Ko, Seung-hyun. Small stones that flew down alongside rainwater met my eyes. While walking up alongside the road, I could create some work. It was a pleasant start. I felt like I could do something continuously. While climbing higher towards the mountain while passing a big zelkova tree, I worked in some more simple works.

I came back to the house of nature art. Most artists still are talking about this and that. There are artists who are lying down to take a rest from hard work so far. Kim, Yong-ik is looking for me. He asks me to take a photograph of the empty house that he went to work in. I went inside the empty house, following Mr. Kim. The yard is tangled with grass and garbage. The floor is fully stacked with dust. Then, what immediately meets my eyes is a golden pillar. A golden pillar in a cold empty house. What an extreme contrast. There has to be something. However, rather than thinking about the meaning, I enjoy just looking at it for now.

 

 

Kim, Yong-ik

Sun that burns still after lunch does not get discouraged. I hear the sound of a motorcycle, roaring. Kang Hur steps inside the main gate, riding a nice motorcycle. Behind, Anke Mellin comes in with a bicycle.

 

Ri, Eung-woo asks me to take a photograph. I packed my camera and went to the stream beside a zelkova tree, with Kang Hur. In a low stream bank where clean water flows, he installed from small stone to a big stone. As I tried to take a photograph, Kang Hur said, "It would be great if you could sit like a stone. Why don't you take off your shirt? " Ri, Eung-woo answered "No, if I am going to take off, I have to take it all off!". Ah, I love it! It is a meditative atmosphere where he is sitting face to face with stones. I feel as though he is going inside nature by the stones that are getting smaller. No, I feel like sitting outside of nature alongside the stones. Another artwork was the work to bend and insert small branches in a tree crack.

 

 

Ri, Eung-woo 

I came down from the valley and sat down under the shade of the zelkova tree. A burning sunlight squeezes between the leaves and falls on top of a big rock. A pretty round shapes of sunshine is reflected on the rock. I picked the round leaves that were around and put it on the dazzling sunlight.

 

 

Jeon, Won-gil

Under the sky where there is not a speck of cloud, artist Ryu, Seung-gu is working. The grass that grew noticeably in the middle of the garden that I saw as soon as I stepped into the house of nature art in Wongol seems to have spoken to him. He brings chestnut bur and stacks them around the grass as if he is building a castle. That nameless grass now has become the lord of the chestnut castle and is more mature. At Yatoo Workshop, the artist sometimes mediates the meeting of nature with nature. By mediating the meeting of natural object that met his eyes and the natural object that he found around that, he lets the nature to speak of itself.

 

 

Ryu, Seung-gu

A bustling movement is felt inside the isolated house in Wongol. Miae Song is collecting the sound of bugs and wind in the forest, with a recording microphone on her hand. Donald who came from New Zealand is picking some branches behind the brushwood with his shirt off. Some time later, Lee, Jong-hyup came with some grapes and Dunkin' donuts that I like. Artists sit around the stream bank, wash the grapes and eat them enjoyably.

Even though it felt a little early, We build the fire for a barbecue. Isn't the Yatoo Workshop indeed perfect if it is accompanied with a barbecue? Some artists go up, following Ko, Seung-hyun to pick some perilla seed leaves. Meat is grilled, a round of drinks takes place and everyone gets happy. While everyone is busy eating, Nereus Patrick who came from Cameroon held a scissor. Roger's hair is cut. African hair style is moved to the Filipino artist's hair.

We moved to indoors. With the impressive presentation of Mr. Kim, Yong-ik, the night darkens. Beds are assigned to this and that room. People who snore will be gathered in one room and will stay up all night with a snoring harmony. Ri, Eung-woo, Mr.Kim, Yong-ik , Ryszard and myself who stayed until late talking, went to the stream bank under the zelkova tree, with a towel in our hands. We felt a little cool chill until we took off our clothes and went into the water but it felt very cool and nice after a little while. Just like that, we took a bath like fairies(?) in the stream where water fog billowed while listening to the flowing sound of water.

It is the second day of Yatoo Workshop. There are many who still feel dull due to overdrinking last night. Not knowing who started it, everyone stand lined up and massage the person standing in front. What a nice view of human. Artists who are now much more friendly with each other sit down, share their thoughts and minds.

Lee, Min-woo who came from Daejeon and other artists combine their efforts and tie the branches that are broken due to the wind, with a straw rope. It is doubtful that by doing this, a broken tree can be revived but it is an action that the consideration of human is entrusted towards life.

As they get used to Wongol, they have to leave, to their regret. Considering the work schedule of Biennale, we decided to evacuate a little bit early. When everyone is getting ready to leave Wongol, Anke Mellin installs a video camera to her bicycle. She installs a video camera on the back seat of the bicycle and leaves the house of nature art. What is she trying to do?

Kang Hur left first, giving a ride to Ryszard on his motorcycle. By the look of it, I think that Ryszard would look better to drive a motorcycle than Kang Hur. After assigning locking up and finishing to Eungwoo Ri, I left for Mountain Yeonmi. On my way back, I shared a brief conversation with Sandor Vass, Karen, Roger, and Patrick regarding the Yatoo Workshop. Most of them tell me that it was a satisfying experience.

I personally found a meaning of Yatoo Workshop that are different from so far, through this Yatoo Workshop. While thinking with nature and moving my body to where nature leads, I felt a full freedom. I think to be able to deviate from the desire to earn fame as an artist or an expectation towards a commercial achievement is the important value that Yatoo Workshop has. Without such free mind, chaste works such as Karen's work which simply picks some leaves and puts it onto palms or Ri, Eung-woo`s work which bends and puts branches into the ground could not have been done. Likewise, doesn't artist's freedom come when doing a work that seems to be nothing, in a wholehearted manner.

Artists who came back to Mountain Yeonmi's site get themselves ready to get back to their Biennale's work. The thing that should be kept the same when working at Yatoo Workshop or works that are left as more detailed work is the problem how nature actually operates within that work. Sculptural installation work which only used natural objects cannot secure a difference with a general work. At the works of Yatoo Workshop, natural objects maintain their original status as nature and come inside art. Through artworks that acts as art while brooding nature, I get the vitality of nature delivered. Since such works approach people easily and includes nature's organic structure within itself, it gives us a different inspiration each time it is viewed.

 

 

4. Artworks of 2010 Geumgang Nature Art Biennale's Yatoo Workshop

After dinner, I proceeded a slide show with the Workshop materials that we worked for two days at the house of nature art in Wongol. It was a more fascinating atmosphere compared to the case of other presentations. Projector is installed and Workshop artworks at Wongol are shown. It is the work of Patrick Tagoe-Turkson who started to express his mind with his body, without hesitation. First few works are the ones that I am aware of, since I shot the photographs but besides them, works that he covered himself with grass and made the hat out of a pumpkin is something that I had not seen. They are happy and pleasant artworks.

Next is the work of Ko, Seung-hyun. In 2008, he worked on the artwork where he is holding leaves hanging long from a tree in a mouth and this time, he picked a handful of foxtails, held them in his mouth and lay down facing the sky. Sunlight fall, shining grass and face. It is as if he is trying to grow the grass that grew from his mouth, in a better way.

 

Ko, Seung-hyun

It is the work of Kim, Sun-hee, Biennale's staff who took the nice picture of Ko, Seung-hyun's artwork. She cut a young zucchini with a scissor and took the photograph of the sap that formed in the stem of the zucchini with the handle of a red pruning shears. The contrast of red and green, scissor and the stem of a zucchini were directed in a brief and general way.

While I was proceeding the slide show, I did not mention the names of artists first. I made the audience to ask the names of artists during the process of the slide show, only when they were curious. It was because of the thought to expect them to view artworks without prejudice and to share everything as nature's product. In addition, I wanted to create an atmosphere to mutually respond through the process of asking names.

 

 

Kim, Sun-hee,

Mr. Kim, Yong-ik's work was enough to strongly impress all artists who participated. The reason maybe the fact that his work 'worship' which he worked on the basis of the impression that he got in India that he introduced as the old future through the presentation on the day before, might have been remembered. Even though his work did not have a pure nature as its object, that empty house where people had lived and left reflects his critical and warm vision which view the ecology of human history. He talks about the true recovery of nature which can only be told in a foreign language. The twisted language, an old future talks about the despair of a pleasant life as well as the honor of a primitive life. However, what can we do, contemporary men cannot retreat even one step from their current life, right? I thank Mr. Kim, Yong-ik to have provided the opportunity to view the nature and human life in a balanced way, through this Workshop.

As a Biennale's work, Donald Buglass left a dome shaped work beside the tomb in the entrance of Mountain Yeonmi. He worked all day long without resting at dawn everyday, waking up the fellow authors with the sound of engine saw and finally completed a dome that is clearly cut. It is a shelter of a life that first welcomes the people who come to Mountain Yeonmi.

His work shown through Yatoo Workshop is unexpectedly light. The work of a beer bottle that he titled 'Reverse flow', he shows an attachment. Like what he said, nature is an open world where setting up a limit is impossible. If one worships nature too much, he/she loses nature in the end.

 

 

Roger tibon

Roger is interested in the playfulness of Yatoo that resembles children's play, with points that a mind like children is something like the original form of human's emotion lost within the educational system that is institutionalized and stiffen, and inside works that are done as children's play not only include children's naiveness and simplicity of play but also precious value of human nature.

 

 

 

Ryszard Litwiniuk

Ryszard did not seem to do any particular work during the Workshop. But in the memory stick he handed me had many number of works. He shows various works apart from the drawing work that he used vines or the shadow work that he used his own body.

When did he make all this. I feel sorry that this space is too small to introduce all his work. I thought that even though his shadow work is a work consisted of a minimum action such as to do a rock paper scissor with fingers but his work is as clear and neat enough as the monumental sculpture work of his. It is a model that is made with the hot sun that burns in the clear sky which is the most vivid but that cannot be owned.

 

 

Sandor Vass

Sandor Vass is showing the mark that came from sticking his back onto the ground. Marks of pine cones, pine needles and branches are vivid. The moles that Sandor himself might not have seen much and the aspect of nature that is marked in red look so nice together. In this Biennale, he is doing a drawing work in the method of meeting with nature by walking on foot and recording that journey. In this Biennale, he is meeting with nature with all of his body.

 

 

 

Karen

Karen showed the neatest work among the artists who participated in this Yatoo Workshop. I think the range of series work that used leaves and lines of palm is an excellent work that has a persuasion in itself that does not need any other explanation. The work where she puts her hand in the same direction as ivy leaves is a heart touching work. I like the work where she contrasts her hair to dry leaves since it does not intentionally take the form as art. As if it had been there, nature and human's body meet.

 

 

Pawel Chlebek

Pawel Chlebek shows his feeling inside the work. Isn‘t the existence of emotion the most different aspect between human and nature? Humans are unstable beings due to emotions and a graceful existence due to those emotions. The pepper work that delivers sense and humor drew the laughter of his co-creators during the presentation.

 

 

 

Kang Hur

Kang Hur is the one who always hides interesting thoughts and shows them all of sudden. As I turn my head after hearing the statement "Take the picture of this", he puts a foxtail on his head, makes a shadow and wavers them. The figure of it hanging like a pendulum is vivid. After changing the camera to a video mode and counting to 60, I told him to stop. Grass and time, nature and human, human that lives within the time that flows unintentionally, it is a strange pose clock play that cannot always be captured but cannot be passed by.

 

 

 

Toni Schaller took the photograph of the spider web that he found. He is the one who worked diligently without a word during the creation period of Biennale. Along with the smile that gives a deep trust, he showed the photographs that he had taken. This work might have been first. When I was arranging his image files later on, I found a number of more works additionally, that he took the butterfly sitting on a flower. Maybe Toni did not think of these photographs as works. As if to take the treasure that someone else had hidden, I carefully moved them to my computer.

The artist who left the most number of works during the Workshop period would be Nereus Patrick Cheo. As to untie the skein of thread, his work continued in stones, pine cones, wood peels, cone stalk, a found rope, etc. I wish his powerful movement in nature to continue too, back in his country.

 

 

Suzy Sureck created two pieces of works during the Workshop period. One is the work that used the rope that looks exactly like the real snake and another work is a video work where she soaked her hair in the valley water. This work where she worked with Ri, Eung-woo was for the two people to untie their long hair and let it flow with their hair. The last minute where two people keep tune with each other, hold their head and sweep their hair back can be the highlight of the work. It is a comical and unique work that starts from a serious gesture and finally draws everyone's laughter. After coming back to Mountain Yeonmi, Suzy Sureck revived the lingering memory of the Workshop and made a number of drawing works on Korean papers with the bamboo paintbrush that she made which was taller than herself. The movement of the paintbrush looks like to serve the flow of valley water that is remembered in her hair.

Eizo Sakata also performed the video and installation work simultaneously. I like his short video work more. It is a work to insert a pine needle into the pine cone. It is the work that a weak pine needle is standing, wavering dangerously and disappears by the wind that blew at an instant.

 

 

5. Epilogue

The presentation ended with an applause. While I was picking photographs to print the artworks of artists, I thought again. With the attitude to put oneself up in front of nature, one cannot accept nature or nature can reveal her true self. Yatoo Workshop which listens the sound from nature and works with nature is like a door to newly meet with nature and a place to listen to the voice of God that is inherent in nature. While passing the door, artists share one spirit called Yatoo. If I could be close with the deep and wide world called nature through this Workshop, the world of artwork will be full of vitality, and by experiencing the freedom that artists are supposed to enjoy, I think that they will not be swayed by the attraction of powerful money of capitalism and a desire for fame that is extremely dangerous.

Even though Yatoo has been walking the same road for 30 years, it did not draw out a critical response that is meaningful. It is due to the fact that we have been silently working what we are supposed to do without putting up a clear attitude as an artistic movement. I think that this Workshop was a meaningful program that experienced the honest response of the artists who are interested in nature art. From now, Yatoo will actively discuss about the attitude that artists are supposed to take as the human who lives together with nature, along with many domestic and foreign artists who wish to work with nature.

I wish to meet the artists of 2010 Geumgang Naure Art Biennale again, those who would be working in their own country. To meet someday and through discussing and working with the work that we have been working until then, I wish to be able to broaden the width of thoughts about nature art into the world. From the bottom of my heart, I would like to express my gratitude and greetings to all artists who toiled together in a hot summer.