“I want people to realize that we are all together - we are one big tapestry.”
— Sky Kim
Sky Kim is known for her meticulously patterned, intricate watercolors. Her paintings function as optical illusions, pulling the viewer into a meditative state of increased tranquility. This meditation acts as a central concern in her work, and this stillness is the rudder of her artistic production. “I have to raise my vibrations to the highest level,” she says of her process “and I put myself in that state so that I am closer to my highest self.” From this point of departure, she then creates complex, repetitive patterns that appear to undulate and pulsate if the viewer engages with the work for a lengthy period of time, creating an energy that exudes from the center of her work and is then experienced by the viewer.
Themes of reincarnation and ritual are also prevalent in her work. Through the act of looking, she attempts to reconnect her viewers to their sense of blank slate perfection, which according to the philosophy of reincarnation, we lose as soon as we are born into the world. Her final inspiration is drawn from Sacred geometry - an ancient, spiritual mathematical language that anchors certain aesthetics in nature and its evolution. Kim believes that humans are in a constant state of flux, and evolution and as such our lives and selves never cease to expand outwards, just as the Universe does. Contrary to the more traditionally understood linear temporal or energetic expansion, these ancient principles of sacred geometry, its logarithms and designs, aid Kim in exploring existential queries into humanity - an essential inquiry that resides at the heart of all of her work.
Sky Kim was born in Seoul, Korea, and completed her MFA at the Pratt Institute. She is a recipient of the Jersey City Individual Artist Fellowship, National Korean Art Competition Awards and a Pratt Institute Art Grant. Her work has been exhibited internationally, including in the United States, Denmark, the United Kingdom, Mexico, Germany, Canada, and Australia. Kim lives and works in New York.
