About
Artist Statement
Umji Kim (b. 1998, Seoul)
Umji Kim makes poetic paintings, small sculptures, and dramatic spaces rooted in literary texts she writes herself. Her central subject is the permanence of the unreachable: dilemmas that are eternal precisely because they are never resolved.
The act of repeatedly erasing and repainting mirrors the way characters in her texts remain devoted to impossible goals like impossible transformation, uneasy coexistence, love that cannot be understood, and escape from reality.
Her practice holds open the gap between text and material image, allowing each to exceed or betray the other, so that impossibility itself becomes the condition of making.
This interest in material resistance is grounded in her training in Korean painting techniques and conservation during her graduate studies, where she conducted research into preparatory layers (grounds and sizing). By applying a range of sizing agents, including animal glue, agar, plant-based emulsions and gesso, across supports such as linen, wood panel, silk, and paper, she produced a systematic body of preparatory layer samples. In this research, the ground is not a neutral surface but a field that simultaneously absorbs and resists: it embodies the tension between invasion and refusal, the push toward form and the matter that holds back.
Ultimately, her works and the stories within them are acts of devotion toward unattainable goals, variations on the dilemma. Through them, she brings choices we once pursued or let slip into a reimagined destiny, placed in the here and now.
She is currently participating in the Sothu Artist Residency Programme in Mallorca (Sothu Gallery, 2026). Previous exhibitions include the solo show Twilight Zone (00 of 00, 2023) and the group exhibition Bubbl-ing Marbl-ing (Incheon Art Platform, 2024).
Curriculum Vitae
Dates
Born 1998, Seoul, South Korea
Lives and works in Seoul, South Korea
Education
2021-2024 MA Art & Culture, Korea University, Seoul, South Korea
2017-2021 BA Fine Art, School of Art and Design, Korea University, Seoul, South Korea
2022 Exchange student in University of Amsterdam, Amsterdam, Netherlands
Solo Exhibitions
May. 2024
Rituals, Annpak Space, Seoul, South Korea
Oct. 2023
Twilight Zone, 00 of 00, Seoul, South Korea
Group Exhibitions
Jun. 2024
A Bird Without Name, Seoul Art Space Mullae, Seoul, South Korea
Mar. 2024
Bubbl-ing Marbl-ing, Incheon Art Platform, Incheon, South Korea
Dec. 2023
WESS Exhibition / Publication, 2023, Rasun Library, Seoul, South Korea
Dec. 2022
Waiting Room, Suchi, Seoul, South Korea
Dec. 2021
Kyungdong Market Research Project: So I will eat you!🍴, Project Miraeyutong, Seoul, South Korea
Residency
Feb. 2026 sothu artist residency program, Mallorca, Spain
Workshop / Program
July. 2023
Dividing the Pie, 00 of 00, Seoul, South Korea
Dec. 2021
Kyungdong Market Research Project: So I will eat you!, Project Miraeyutong, Seoul, South Korea
Publication / Press
Aug. 2025
Selected Artist for “Artist of the Month (AOM Project)” 2025, PAI_32, London, UK
Dec. 2023
Selected Artist for “WESS Exhibition / Publication” 2023, Rasun Library, Seoul, South Korea
Grants / Scholarship
2025 Gyeonggi Arts Support 2nd Competition (Youth Artist Independence Preparation Grant) 2025, Gyeonggi Cultural Foundation
Research Assistant (A) Scholarship 1st Semester, 2021; 2nd semester, 2021, Korea Univeristy, South Korea
Research Assistant (A) Scholarship 1st Semester, 2021; 2nd semester, 2021, Korea Univeristy, South Korea
Administrative Assisstant Scholarships 2nd semester, 2022; 1st semester, 2021, Korea University, South Korea.
Special Scholarship, 1st semester, 2020, Korea Univeristy, South Korea
Alumni Association Scholarship, 1st semester, 2020, Korea Univeristy, South Korea
Teaching / Advising
Aug. 2025 ― Nov. 2025
Teaching Assistant
Mar. 2021 ― Feb. 2022
Research & Teaching Assistant
School of Art and Design, Korea University
- Contemporary Painting Workshop(English), 1st Semester, 2021
- Individual Creative Art Studio, 1st Semester, 2021
- Basic Media Study(English), 2nd semester, 2021
- Independent Study(English), 2nd semester, 2021