Kresge showcases Korean-born artist's abstract piece

In a small corner installation inside MSU’s Kresge Art Museum, the chaotic, powerful vision of a Korean-born artist has finally come to fruition.

“Paper Deep,” a special wall-mounted drawing painted by artist Haeri Yoo, opened to the public for the first time Wednesday as part of the museum’s new exhibit examining Korean culture.

Chinese and Japanese artwork has been common at the museum recently, curator April Kingsley said, but MSU has not had many pieces from the small coastal Asian country.

“We’re always trying to keep track of what’s going on in the world and all these Asian aspects of things are very interesting right now and getting attention,” Kingsley said. “We wanted to give it attention too.”

Yoo’s colorful, energetic display contradicts some of the beliefs she saw growing up in South Korea, she said.

“It’s kind of conservative in Korea,” she said. “That’s why I chose such a very emotional (style).”

The museum briefly was closed during the month of August, which gave Yoo the opportunity to come to East Lansing from her current home in Brooklyn, New York, to create the massive two-wall installation.

Yoo worked about 12 hours per day for six days to finish her most recent piece, only taking breaks for food or a nap on a small mat nearby, Kingsley said.

What she created was difficult for Kingsley to characterize.

“It seems like it pours out (of the wall),” she said. “I don’t know how to describe it.”

Yoo’s bright, colorful mural — which Kingsley said reminded her of Picasso’s “Guernica” — is a mash of abstract human shapes and broad, purposeful brushstrokes.

“I see what feels like a lot of chaos, but you know that it’s very specific at the same time,” said Cassandra Hibbard, a museum visitor and music performance doctoral student. “It’s very hard to get that concept all at once, so it’s very fascinating to look at.”

The South Korean native’s art came as a noticeable contrast to the traditional, centuries-old paintings that share the exhibit with Yoo, Hibbard said.

“It was definitely a shock walking in here,” she said. “I wasn’t really ready for it.”

Yoo breaks from some traditional Korean tendencies with “Paper Deep,” such as leaving several places on the wall blank, which she called narrative spaces.

Yoo said she didn’t necessarily want her work to be considered as Korean or as womens’ art, she wanted it to be a representation of humanity. The chaotic look of the painting is Yoo’s way of representing sexuality and violence, she said.

But even though she’s embraced a more modern motif, Yoo said she still sees how her home country has shaped her.

When the piece was completed, she said, “I can recognize myself as a Korean who was born in Korea.”