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Thank You

Our exhibition “Wire and Wood” at Koa Gallery is now history. We are so grateful to all of our friends and family that supported us with so much affection and good will, and everyone who came to see the show.

We tried to put on a show that was both visually and intellectually provocative and satisfying. It is hard to say when we could pull off another such endeavor. Needless to say, it was a lot of work. We measure our success in the support we have gotten from all of you.

A big Mahalo to all,
George and Jinja Kim

Having a Show

What is there about showing a body of work? Months, even years of effort spent pounding away at stubborn materials to make a presentation results in what? Maybe, if you are lucky there are a couple of sales. Very likely, everything comes home to take up valuable space and remind you of your inadequacies. This is not a practical thing to do for most of us. But it is a marker, a sure sign that you are taking your work seriously. And if we do not take our own work seriously how can we expect anyone else to?

Art is a strange business. If it is not shared it really does not exist. Can you imagine a dance performance without an audience? The visual artist is no less a performer, it’s just that the artwork is now an embodiment of the creative effort even as the artist steps aside to show it. A show may be all the opportunity you get to communicate with others the ideas, images and passions that drive you. It is a statement of your life, and how can that be overstated? No matter how much work it is, an artist needs to put his work into perspective. Until the art is given space and is well presented with good lighting and complimentary surroundings it is just guess work. Every artist should have at least one personal exhibition.

The show “Wire and Wood” will be up until April 21st at the Koa Art Gallery. Opening hours are Tuesday to Saturday, 10 am to 3 pm. Free and open to the public. Address: KCC, 4303 Diamond Head Rd, Honolulu, Hawaii 96816.

Artist’s Statement

I am looking for emotional resonance, a coming together of mind, body and sensation. This resonance could be thought of as a sense of color or light.

The wood was, until recently alive, standing tall and expressing great vitality. Cutting it down arrests this growth but allows it to gradually dry, crack, rot and generally offer itself up as a resource and not as a tree. The wood has called to me, wanting to have its life back and not be left to rot into oblivion. It is very hard and heavy, actually somewhat like stone. The process of basic shaping is done with chainsaws and power tools. Hand tools are used only at the end for refinement. A shape is not unlike a drawing. Edges are actually lines drawn in three dimensions. And once we start thinking in terms of drawing it is easy to see that we also are painting. The painting being the suggestion of something. So while you are looking at these pieces and thinking sculpture, I am thinking painting. Paintings are images, they are creations of the imagination and that is what we have here.

I want my images to resonate. I want them to feel alive, to be emotionally, physically and intellectually alive. To make this happen requires a transformation and I cannot make this happen on my own. The wood must come to me, the tools must come to me, the colors must come to me. I have to work hard and be patient. These are long-term projects that may take years to complete. I am half of the equation but no more. They are “finished” again and again in the sense that every activity done to them is meant to be definitive, the last word. It is balance I am looking for and a feeling of knowing the piece intimately.

A good deal of this “knowing” is achieved through the sense of touch. We can see with our eyes but also with our hands. We can feel texture, and texture is linked to color which is how we emotionally experience the world. I want to know color. In its broadest sense, color is emotional resonance. We talk about hearing the color of sounds in music, or the color of joke or a personality. Having a sense of color is having an affinity for the feeling quality of something. Now we can talk because everyone experiences the world through their emotions. This is the common ground I am looking for.

When you ask, what does it mean?, I will tell you that it means I am present in the work and also that the work is present in me. We have made a bargain, I gave the work 50% of me and the work gave me 50% of itself. Art is self-reflective, it is a mirror to the artist, in effect a stand-in. By repeatedly engaging, the forms and the surfaces gradually reveal themselves. I do not have sketches to go by, but I do look for certain things to happen.

I have been inspired by the simple majesty of Korean ceramics, particularly Joseon period celadon moon jars. I am also drawn to boats, cars, toys and tools. These are all things that get handled. They have a functional character to them. I want my work to seem familiar, but not be really functional. The response I am looking for is: “ Wow, these things are undeniable in their physicality but I don’t quite understand what they are”

The epiphany that I had is that the most engaging work raises questions rather than answering questions. What are they, why did I make them, what are they made of, how did I make them and what should we do with them?

George Woollard, Artist’s statement, Koa Gallery, April 13, 2017. The show “Wire and Wood” will be up until April 21st. Koa Gallery hours are Tuesday to Saturday, 10 am to 3 pm. The events and exhibition are free and open to the public. Address: KCC, 4303 Diamond Head Rd, Honolulu, Hawaii 96816.

Artists’ Talk & Walk Through the “Wire and Wood”

My wife Jinja Kim and I came from opposite ends of the earth and met here in Hawaii in the printmaking shop at the Univ. of Hawaii in 1972. We were both enrolled in the MFA program in printmaking. I think we saw in each other a kindred spirit – we had a passion for art that had been there since early childhood. It is this common ground that has been our savior for nearly forty years of marriage.

This is, in fact, our second show together at the Koa Art Gallery. Our last time was in 2000. Some things have changed, mainly we have gotten older. But we have never taken a break from making art.

Outwardly, you would think we have been successful, we have a beautiful home and studio, and a new car, and a dog in the driveway. But we still have trouble making ends meet. It’s just that not making art is not an option for us. We would shrivel up and die without art in our lives. Art defines us, enlivens us and makes us whole. It is a religion, a faith and an obsession. We do not make art because it is lucrative, or brings us fame. It is our fate.

We would like to have the opportunity to share more thoughts on the life of an artist and to talk about the current body of work we are showing at the Koa Art Gallery. Please join us for a little talk and walk-through of the gallery on Thursday, April 13th at 2:30 pm. We’d love to see you there!

Our show “Wire and Wood” will be up until April 21st at the Koa Art Gallery.

Address: KCC, 4303 Diamond Head Rd, Honolulu, Hawaii 96816. Koa Gallery hours are Tuesday to Saturday, 10 am to 3 pm. The events and exhibition are free and open to the public.

Wire and Wood

My wife, Jinja Kim and I are having an art show at the Koa Art Gallery at KCC. We call it “ Wire and Wood”. It is a collaboration where we show our differing sensibilities, hers being light and airy and mine being heavy and dense.

In both our works there is the intention to up-cycle, to take found objects from our property and transform them into art. In her case it is metal and mine is wood. We think it makes for a lively and novel mix.

Please join us on Wednesday, April 5th from 4:30 to 7:30 pm for our opening reception or just come by and see the show, which will be up until April 21.

Artists’ Talk will be held on Thursday, April 13th from 2:30 pm.

Koa Gallery hours are Tuesday to Saturday, 10 am to 3 pm. The events and exhibition are free and open to the public. Address: KCC, 4303 Diamond Head Rd, Honolulu, Hawaii 96816

One and the same

Is it just coincidence that the colors of my sculptures are virtually identical to the colors of the plants outside? And what about the wood? Well, that came from the large Lychee that I cut down that was growing about twenty feet away. And the forms? There are banana trees in the vicinity and roundish boulders in the stream nearby. If we allow ourselves to be influenced by our surroundings, half of the work of making art can be done for us.

I live in a tropical rain forest and my work grows out of the jungle that is my home. It seems that all my work is a collaboration of one kind or another. I let the wood come to me and I go to the wood, we meet somewhere in between. It is the same with the tools, the chainsaw does half the work and I do half the work. In every case, there is a meeting that takes place. The results of these meetings are like little fires being started. There is a combustion that takes place. I guide the process, direct the flow of activities but try not to take too big a role in taking credit for the results. If we are to be original artists, we must be true to our origins. When we fully belong to our time and place, we may be able to offer insights that give a truly different point of view. It is our birthright and our destiny to fulfill our potential as creative individuals.

Finding your voice, sharing a vision

It might seem that no-one should be interested in your personal view of things. But you would be wrong. It is precisely a personal vision that is most engaging for others. Tried and true may generate some sales but is absolutely of no use in generating original art. What is needed is a vision, the ability to project a thought and foresee an outcome. As this is necessarily a scary proposition, we need to have courage. You will find your voice when you find your courage. There can be no safe way to make good art, it will always be a proposition with an uncertain outcome. Self-doubt comes with the territory. You just have to try it and even then you may not know if it was a good idea. But vision is a learned skill, you will get better at it by practicing. Sharing your vision is a matter of packaging, of formatting it and presenting it so that others can access it. Be assured, it is worth the trouble.

Sixty year old tractor, seventy year old driver

For the last 27 years, this old machine and I have been excavating, grading, pouring concrete and moving mountains of wood and brush. It seems hard to believe that we are both still running. It must be in the genes. Without this beast, there would certainly not be any large sculptures to show.

So, the Lychee tree is cut down so as not to break off and fall on the studio. That is the easy part. Then we feast on all the Lychee nuts that are all over the ground. When everyone we can think of has all the fruit they can eat, I separate the small branches and drive them to the large brush pile to decompose in their own sweet time. Next, the middle size logs are cut into short lengths to be used for firewood and are stacked near the fire pit. Finally, the big logs are cut into manageable sizes and built into a wall of Lychee wood that can be accessed by the tractor and delivered to the wood carving shed.

It takes about two years to sort out all the wood and get it to where it belongs. In the meantime, the wood is slowly losing moisture, rotting around the edges and getting drilled by the powder post beetles. All this decay and insect activity is confined to the outer 3-4 inches of the log. Cozy inside is the heart wood which can be fashioned into art. It may take another 2-3 years of deliberating and working before realizing a piece in its final form. These are long term projects. A watercolor can be painted in less than an hour. How does one medium inform the other?

Capsize

I think of an image as a metaphor. It has recognizable qualities that bring to mind something familiar. Using images changes the art into a kind of storytelling. This does not mean that it is any less abstract. I am thinking that abstraction refers to the practice of conceptualizing and has nothing to do with realism per se. So a piece can be both abstract and recognizable. It is this state of flux that is so interesting. Can we, in fact, be in two places at the same time? And what exactly are we looking at?

The act of making a print is inherently mysterious. A certain amount of preparation goes into setting up the plate, but ultimately it is the printing press that actually produces the print. Lifting the wet print from the plate has the quality of opening a present, there is always a surprise inside. It is exciting to discover the image in this way. The only question is can we allow ourselves to have this much fun? After all, life is serious.

Capsized /12″x27″ / mixed media mono print with collage

Where we live and how we think

How does the rain affect you? Here in the depths of Palolo Valley far from the concrete jungle of the city I can only think how amazingly beautiful! The colors and forms of the mountainside are softened, the bamboo sways gently in the mist and the sounds are of running water flowing over rocks and rain sweeping down the valley in great gusts. Every day I feel blessed to be a witness to so much beauty, and it right here in my back yard. Nature envelops me and informs all the things I do, especially my art. My life becomes a reflection of this place. It is not incidental that my thinking, my philosophy of art making is rooted in my surroundings.

This is old Hawaii and I feel the power of the place. This rain is spilling over the ridge top and being driven by Trade Winds gathering force over thousands of miles of open ocean. And I am right at the apex, the confluence of an unlikely island in the middle of the Pacific Ocean and global wind and ocean currents. It is a rare privilege to live in a modern metropolis like Honolulu and to be completely absorbed by the ancient Aina of the land. How could I not be bold with so much power all around me? It is a robust place that leads to robust art. Hawaii may not be the center of the art world but it very well may be the center of the world. It is essential that we are a part of a larger picture than just ourselves. Where that sense of connection comes from varies but somehow we need to belong. When we know a place at an intuitive level, we are empowered.