drawing lines with a pencil-/)
MAYPAPER Kunah 02
이 매거진은 한국어를 읽지 못하는 저의 아들과 친구들을 위해 발행하는 영어버전의 매거진입니다.
This magazine is an English version publication created for my son and my friends who cannot read Korean.
한국어 버전의 글 : https://brunch.co.kr/@maypaperkunah/12
"Mom! I want to go to an art academy."
It started with those words.
Mom found the perfect art studio for me!
It took a full 30 minutes to drive there,
but I went there every day.
For three years.
That's how my artistic life started.
On the first day, all I did was practice drawing lines with a 4B pencil. For two hours, I filled the sketchbook with nothing but lines. At first, I had to stand up every 10 minutes. It was so boring. I wondered what the point of this was.
After the first class, there were 10 sheets of drawing paper!!
I didn’t know if I was using my time or if time was using me!
One line per second.
If it was 2 hours, it was 7200 seconds!
That’s 7200 lines!!!
It's a treasure!!
The overwhelming feeling was beyond a fourth-grade child's control. It has been the driving force that has kept me fascinated with art for 30 years, and it was specifically those 7200 lines that make up the intense memory of that first day that led my life towards art!
With that sense of accomplishment, I wanted to draw them again from the time I started heading home, and I couldn’t wait to go back there.
On the second day, I practised drawing lines again.
The third day was the same.
For a month, I did nothing but practise.
Straight lines, diagonal lines, curved lines.
Lightly, darkly, and even gradation.
The sound of pencils drawing filled the art room.
The pencil made the whole sketchbook black.
The drawing paper filled my heart with lines.
My heart was filled with sound, colour, and lines.
It's funny to think about it now. A fifth-grade child got into the rhythm by drawing lines with a pencil. I quite liked the scratching sounds of the pencil as I moved it faster or more slowly. The faster the scratching sound, the faster my hands got. Black lines appeared when I ran the pencil over the paper. It was magical.
Each seat in the art room was occupied by the sounds of the pencils.
Filling shapes
After filling the shapes, I saw something magical!
From a single black 4B pencil,
I saw yellow,
then purple appeared,
and soon even white was visible!
This was surely magic, not reality!
The surprise is still as fresh as ever. But now I know why. Black consists of a variety of shades like rich black, cool black, charcoal black, and midnight black. If you look closely, within black, there is yellow, purple, and even white. The first time I discovered playing with colours, I was completely absorbed in this game. That's how I gradually embarked on my journey in the world of art.
But still, even now, I cannot paint a deep, true black. The blackest black in existence is Vantablack, which absorbs light and energy. And some say a black hole contains the darkest black of all. Perhaps because I’ve never experienced the blackness of the universe, deep black remains the most challenging for me. In the second month, as I finished practising line drawing, I began to fill shapes.
Drawing a square with four lines, I filled a flat shape;
creating a triangle with three lines, I balanced and filled the shape.
And a circle? I gently connected short lines to form a circle-like shape.
Pretending it was a circle, I filled the surface.
What if the circle was skewed? I gently erased and fixed it seamlessly.
But I was confused whether the surface of the circle should be round or flat.
Meeting 3D shapes
The third month. Now it’s a 3D shape! It has evolved from a flat to a 3D shape.
Make cubes out of squares,
Make a pyramid with four triangles and a square,
Make a cylinder out of two circles and a round rectangle,
Below that,
Make a shadow with gradation.
The three dimensions met the flat surface again.
The three dimensions and the flat surface have become partners.
The dots become the lines,
The lines become the shapes,
The shapes become three-dimensional,
The dots, lines and shapes become Venus, the symbol of beauty,
Finally, they become David, a great young man.
And I still enjoy pencil drawing. I enjoy it and end up loving it. When I was in middle and high school, I liked the smell of pencils, and I even loved the scent of it on my friends' art clothes and even on my hands. I miss that deep scent that permeated everything.
But so far, I didn't know why I liked pencil drawing. And I didn't know why I had to learn pencil drawing for so long. Just for art high school and art college? I spent eight years drawing with pencils at that time, but I now know the truth that drawing is gently trying to awaken in me.
Isn't it true that life is a series of experiences connected like a line, and the mind and soul are contained within it to become a multidimensional 'life'? Could it be that as I, Kunah, accumulate each experience, along with the number known as 'age', my spirit finds its place, my soul becomes clearer, and I live a life that is 'Kunah-like'?
So, has my profile picture always been a self-portrait, drawn with a pencil? This mysterious and exquisite coincidence may have unknowingly held the truth of the black and white drawing contained in my instincts.
"Artist, stand here and sketch this flower.
As always, not just as a single mass, but as an intricately organised structure of each part, worthy of admiration, just like animals or humans, you must be able to see the proud characteristics of change. Thus, one must be both an artist and a botanist, researching while drawing. In doing so, the act itself becomes beautiful."
Rodin
It's Rodin! If I had valued his books in middle and high school, I might have been able to study more meaningfully and go more in-depth in my drawing time. I would have given life to the Venus that I drew. I would have known the philosophical meaning of greatness that David holds. I would have been more interested in black and white designs. I would have loved all of this much earlier.
And black!
Black which contains many colours.
I learn about life from it.
There's more than meets the eye.
It holds many colours, but is only expressed as one.
It's just called black.
Many of my experiences will also appear under my name, Jung Geun-ah,
Behind that, there will be various values that cannot be represented by my name.
My hidden values will be a sketch under a painting that expresses my charm.
I think I will love pencil drawing even more than I do now.
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