The remarkable artwork of Soon-Yeal Yang is seen to be of a very high quality.
In her painting, she offers an ever changing body of subject matter presented with an ever changing use of technique. Images may be symbols or figures that vary from real to surreal. The paintings of Picasso come to mind, with the many changes of style that occurred throughout his lifetime.
When viewing her work over time, one recalls that of other artists who dealt with similar styles and images. Although the paintings are sometimes reminiscent of other artists work, she clearly holds to her own distinctive path. And, as other artists have been seen to do, she began her formal education in painting in a classical tradition that formed the foundation for the work that she does today. The evolution appears natural and consistent. From the basis that she built in classical Asian painting, she has developed a sensibility that is evident in her mature abstractions.
Clearly, Yang was influenced in her early development by her natural surroundings. She began her work in the countryside where trees and flowers were abundant and birds flourished. The weight of that environment affected her affinity for the delicacy of Asian painting, and its effect still shows in the paintings of today. In her recent paintings, Yang demonstrates a continuing beautiful color sense, using ground color or colors that are atmospheric and which make up a fluid space upon which figures are juxtaposed.
Yang's work shows both intuitive and intellectual development. Examination of the nuances of style change exhibit clues as to the time when she left the country for the city. The delicate palette remains, but the figures that invade her life begin to appear in profusion. The figures evoke questions of meaning, both psychological and philosophical, that are timeless and eternal. It is not surprising to discover her intense interest in matters philosophical.
While her painting is unique and singular, it also has a kinship with artists everywhere who begin with natural subjects and go on to find forms that transcend to the spiritual. After her study of the classics, she expends much energy investigating the world of the mind. There is never a distinct transition, since, as many artists do, she seems to go back and forth between painting realistic figures --- always in abstract situations, always in some degree, surreal--- and approaching total abstraction-----
The forms of her aethereal figures simulate those of Klimt--- and the little playful images that jump out randomly from the sea of the background are reminiscent of those presented in the works of Paul Klee. With Klee, a line embraces symbols. It rarely contours or encloses, but rather forms pictographic trajectories in the manner of the earliest Adolph Gottlieb, Mark Rothko, or Joan Miro. Klee developed a linear maze, not unlike the plus and minus system of Mondrian's PIER AND OCEAN series, 1912-1914---- a system that did not close on itself, but kept moving through open spaces.
YANG, SOON-LEAL 2.
Both Klee and Mondrian worked toward a flattening of space--- away from the earlier cubist model, to a more “field-like” space. Their work seemed to inspire the movement toward flatness in art which developed after World War II.
Mondrian's PIER AND OCEAN series of drawings involved a distillation of forms derived from nature to a system of signage--- the plus and minus set of vertical and horizontal lines. (Once having seen his early paintings of trees, one can easily discern the transition from one to the other.) Some of the spaces between the lines were shaded with color to form a sense of shape working within the lines. The art became entirely non-figurative---more symbolic than descriptive. The plus and minus lines seemed to equate to the flickering light on the surface of water, more relating to a spiritual structure of nature itself.
In her early work, Yang carefully observes and records nature---plants, trees, sky, and earth. This ethos is universal among artists in America and Europe. Especially in Germany, a love of the land is obvious in the art over time from Albrecht Durer to Anselm Kiefer. Yang has produced elegant studies of plant growth using minute interlacing of marks and lines. Her techniques are very disciplined, similar to those of the Dutch painters, Piet Mondrian in his early years, and ranging to the freer style of Vincent van Gogh. The spirituality in her work emanates from this era.
As does Yang, the Spanish painter Picasso is an artist who showed a mutability of styles throughout his career. Along with his contemporaries, Braque and Juan Gris, he experimented with cubism where he displayed objects in multiple views simultaneously with contours spread across the surface of the canvas.
She also interjects the use of collage in her investigations. This method plays an important part in analytical cubism. Prime examples of this can be found in the works of the Spanish artists Georges Braque, Juan Gris, the German Kurt Schwitters, and the Russian, Kazimir Malevich.
While the work of Yang obviously has its Asian roots, her development is ongoing and its universality is clearly demonstrated in the number of painters to whose art hers is akin. One whose images repeatedly come to mind when viewing the scope of Yang's production is Joan Miro, the Spanish artist of Catalan origin. Within the work of Miro, there are images in the paintings that can be deciphered, while other images resist being deciphered. Curlicues and curving lines distinguish it from the cubist straight-line geometries. The genius of Miro is in his presenting elements of form separately. There is the fluid atmospheric ground on the canvas and then the use of lines that flow across the surface. Shapes are made by areas of color that move in and out among the other elements. It is left to the eye of the viewer to collect the disparate elements in his mind and thereby perceive the unity of the image.
Further, there is a hieroglyphic handwriting aspect to the pictures which has had a profound effect on abstract expressionism---in particular, the early Adolph Gottlieb and early Mark Rothko. The later paintings of Yang invoke these painters in the way that she randomly selects circles of assorted sizes and randomly distributes these hard-edged shapes over the abstract field of delicate color.
YANG, SOON-YEAL 3.
The surrealists emphasized the importance of the psychological in painting to imply what the artist may be thinking and what the viewer is imagining. The technique of presenting two or more incongruous ideas in a painting moves the viewer to certain interpretations of the image. Objects shown out of place or out of time create a mental effect calculated to stir the imagination of the viewer. Masters of these techniques included the Belgian artist, Rene' Magritte, The Catalan artist, Joan Miro', and the Spanish artist, Salvador Dali. Rivaling them especially in her DREAM AND LOVE series but also throughout, Yang strongly holds her own.
The Russian artist, Wassily Kandinsky, selects objects from nature and progressively abstracts motifs until their original identity dissolves from recognition. This process of taking away the identifiable form from the appearance of things results in endowing that thing with its full inner power and spiritual resonance. Yang is a master at this. Her Klimt-like figures in the beginning have recognizable facial features and period costumes. All seem to be female in form, and as they progress toward abstraction, the shape of the floor length skirt melds into the silhouette as the figure takes on an air of mystery. Adding to this illusion is the transformation of the head of the figure into a shape simulating the question-marks which appeared in preceding paintings.
Yang's movement toward total abstraction is not complete. As her work matures, she moves more and more in that direction. While she achieves a transparency of field by applying a glaze of color over a background color, not always blending, gives a varying depth of field. Sometimes the field resembles the moors in fog described in Bronte's JANE EYRE--- and her canvasses present the same mystery of who or what is lurking in that fog. It may be a silhouette of the tall person with the questionmark head or the ubiquitous bird.
One dictionary defines the word “mystery” as: Any affair or thing that presents qualities so obscure as to arouse curiosity or speculation.
It is that quality in fine art that keeps the viewer intrigued with the image on the canvas. While an artist might be highly technically proficient, the interest of the viewer is not maintained if the picture is too clearly drawn for him. Yang is technically adept, and she is also able to hold the viewers attention at length by presenting images that pose a question “Who?” , “What?”, “Why?”---- and as she transitions toward greater abstraction, the mystery become deeper. It is fortuitous that she is also able to formulate her images with homage to her classical heritage such that the viewer always benefits from her innate color sense and talent for creating a well balance form.
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