Since I was young, I loved to collect used and empty boxes and shopping bags. I was attached to the appearance of these containers that once held things, but were now empty vessels evoking a feeling of loss.

Gradually, unwanted and ignored things have become my art supplies. This has come to include overstock from fellow artists, leftovers from art classes, and even my own unfinished or failed art. I like to work with discarded materials and objects that inspire me to respond to their mysterious history.

I collaborate with the existing surface and form of these salvaged materials, adding gestural marks, saturated and vibrant neon and metallic colors, and layers of collage and decoration. The resulting works are mixed media abstractions that function as visual records of the process of finding, collecting, playing, and finally, transforming these materials. They are presented both as singular nuanced objects and as playful groupings.

My works celebrate the ‘useless’ matter in a world where ‘useful or valuable’ materials are preferred. Transforming these easily discarded materials preserves them from the fleeting nature of their existence.

About Songyi Kim

Kim’s mixed media sculptures and paintings have been featured in numerous exhibitions, including AIM 24 at The Bronx Museum of the Arts, Dorsky Gallery and Tiger Strikes Asteroid in New York. Her residencies include those at the Blackburn Printmaking Workshop Fellowship, Bemis Center for Contemporary Arts, the McColl Center and the Henry Street Settlement among others. Her work, shown across the globe, may also be found in the Deutsche Bank Art Collection. The artist was born in Seoul, Korea and currently lives and works in Brooklyn. She studied at Seoul National University and received her MFA from Virginia Commonwealth University.