Actor Park Shin-yang speaks during a press conference on his exhibition at Sejong Museum of Art in Seoul, Friday. Courtesy of Minumsa
Since his debut in 1992, actor Park Shin-yang has spent decades inhabiting the lives of others on screen. Early in his career, he played a Buddhist monk in “Yuri” (1996), a mafia leader in “A Promise” (1998) and a divorced businessman in "Lovers in Paris" (2004). More recently, he appeared as a lawyer in the KBS drama series “My Lawyer, Mr. Jo” (2016).
Offscreen, however, Park has long focused on understanding himself. Over the years, he read widely in psychology and philosophy, took courses and turned to painting as a way to explore his thoughts and emotions.
Nearly four decades of introspection have culminated in an exhibition that opened at Sejong Museum of Art on Friday.
Titled “The n reflects Park’s attempt to bridge the distance between artist and viewers. In theater, the fourth wall refers to the invisible barrier separating actors from the audience.
Actor Park Shin-yang talks about his paintings at Sejong Museum of Art in Seoul, Friday. Courtesy of Minumsa
The exhibition features nearly 150 works with several recurring motifs.
One of them is the apple. Park began painting apples after receiving one from a philosopher he deeply respected. “As time passed, the apple that I knew disappeared, and I began to see it differently,” he said.
In another series, titled “Bullfighter,” Park likens himself to the figure in the arena. “I am under constant pressure to express. The pressure is so great that I feel like a bullfighter facing a bull. Here, I either win or I lose.”
In the “Kirill” series, Park paints the face of his Russian friend, whom he met while studying drama in Moscow in his younger years. The friend becomes a symbol of something the artist misses — and of the emotion he calls “yearning.”
Source: Korea Times News
