Shim Soo Hyun — Minhwa, Re-read for Today | K-Art & Cultural IP

Shim comes to people slowly, but in painting she hides nothing. The brightness she is careful with in conversation opens fully on the paper: flowers pushed into full bloom, fish set moving, a whole reserve of positive energy spread across the surface.

Her path runs through fashion, hanbok and jogakbo (traditional Korean patchwork) before it reaches minhwa. From jogakbo she kept the asymmetric composition, the breathing negative space, and above all the visible hand-stitch — the mark of time a hand spent on the cloth. She still hand-stitches her fabric works today, matching thread to the painting or to the mood of the day, thinking of each motif's meaning as the needle moves: peony for abundance, tiger for protection, vase for peace in the home.

Two bodies of work carry one idea. In Blossom (피어나다), a wish long held inside finds the courage to break its protective shell and burst outward — not gently, but with force. In Lucky Fish, fish carry people's wishes out into the world and return bearing fortune; where they are trying to arrive, in the end, is back to the self. Blue — the colour of her 2026 solo show — is the sea she lived beside: a colour that both conceals and reveals, calm and alive at once.