Jinny Yu

Within the Korean-Canadian community, there is an artist whom we must remember and take great pride in. It is Jinny Yu, a professor of visual arts at the University of Ottawa and one of the most influential artists of Korean descent on the global stage. As a 1.5-generation artist who was born in South Korea and immigrated to Canada, she goes far beyond simply being a 'painter who draws well'; she is a master in the mainstream art world whose work has been spotlighted by Canada's largest daily newspaper, The Globe and Mail, and eagerly collected and exhibited by top institutions like the National Gallery of Canada and the Art Gallery of Ontario (AGO). Her status was symbolically cemented in 2015, when her work addressing the refugee crisis received global acclaim at the world's most prestigious Venice Biennale.

If we look closely at why Jinny Yu's work is so special, the secret lies in the 'surfaces' she uses. Instead of typical fabric canvases, she uses aluminum panels or mirrors. She applies oil paint onto them, which works a very peculiar kind of magic. When you stand in front of a painting drawn on a mirror, the 'I' viewing the work and the 'space' where I am standing are reflected exactly as they are within the picture. In other words, the painting is not fixed; rather, it is newly completed every time you move and every time the light changes. Though it looks like a two-dimensional painting, it is actually a 'three-dimensional spatial art' and an 'installation art' that draws in the presence of the viewer.