Ik-Joong Kang

Princeton packet, Friday, march 12, 2004

Portrait of the artist

By Jillian Kalonick

 

 

 

The daily walk from artist Ik-Joong Kang's home in the east village of Manhattan to his studio in Brooklyn takes an hour and 10 minutes. It is peaceful ritual for Mr. Kang, perhaps because before he had time to work in a studio, he used his bus and subway commutes to work and school for painting, working on portable three-inch-square canvases.

Mr. Kang built those small paintings into cohesive works, and the tiled, three-dimensional collage effect became his unique style. It is the format he will uses for "Happy World," a 10-foot by 30- foot installation for the lobby of Princeton public library's new building on Witherspoon Street.

Princeton residents donated more than 500 objects to be incorporated into "Happy World," which will contain about 5,000 three-inch squares. Its look will be similar to Mr. Kang's "gateway," a permanent installation at San Francisco International airport, and "Throw Everything Together and Add," which won the special merit prize at the Venice Biennale in 1997.

"I use a lot of objects on top of my painting. I thought it was interesting to let their idea and sprit flow into this wall," he says of "Happy World" The squares look almost like books, stacked cover-up.

Mr. Kang who earned a master's of fine arts degree at the Pratt institute in Brooklyn, has exhibited his works at the Whitney museum of American Art at Philip Morris, the Museum of Contemporary Art in Seoul, Korea.

In "Happy World," he is focused on the intersections of the Princeton community, between the academic installations and the town, the young and old.

"By building this wall we can break the wall- the wall between communities, generations, between past and future," he says.

Along with his wife and five-year-old son, Mr. Kang has visited Princeton several times. He had an opportunity to interact with the community in January when he made a visit to the temporary library in the Princeton Shopping Center to collect materials for "Happy World."

There was this energy and vibration, so warm," he says. "There was a long discussion, with donors explaining about the objects. It was a positive interaction. Traditional public art is a reaction. This one I want to make more level - interacting, sharing with community, learning about other cultures."

During recent visit to Mr. Kang's studio on the top floor of a warehouse in the DUMBO section of Brooklyn, he and his assistants were surrounded by hundreds of the Princeton pieces. Many items are specific to Princeton history: a picture of Paul Robeson, a piece of copper gutter from a Princeton house built in 1948, and many family photographs and letters. Among the more whimsical pieces are a "librarian action figure," a South Indian mask, sea shells, a library card, a Wiffle ball, a clock from the old library on Witherspoon Street, cards from the old paper library catalog and a Rubik's cube.

"Happy World" will be installed over a period of two days before the library's April 1 opening. Participants who donated items will be recognized in a formal documentation, says Jeff Nathanson, of library's art committee. The committee commissioned the installation and several other art works to be displayed in the new library.

"The thing that amazes me bout the artwork is it's an extension of his personality and the way he views the world," says Mr. Nathanson. "It's really deep, inspired, thought-provoking work that functions on a level of interest to artist and critics and curators, as well as communicating effectively to the general public. It's rare to find an artist these days that can (either) be in a museum or public realm."

When Mr. Kang discovered that more than 50 languages are spoken in Princeton households, he invited local students to write the word "library" in their native language on a piece of paper. At least one square from each language will be incorporated into "Happy World."

"The past is knowledge, and there's a vision of future for our children. (The library) is a meeting place for different backgrounds."

Mr. Kang's inclusion of contributions by children echoes his work "100,000 Dreams" (1999), which featured 50,000 drawings from Korean children in the interior of a one-kilometer-long vinyl tunnel in the demilitarized zone in South Korea.

The work has particularly emotional for Mr. Kang, who was born in 1960 in Cheong Ju, South Korea, and has lived in New York City since 1984.

"I'm part of Korea, and Korea is part of me - and (it is) divided. I thought, 'As an artist, what can I do for that?'"

The installation incorporates drawings of children's dreams, but he was able to obtain drawings by children from South Korea only, so half of the canvases were left blank to represent children from North Korea.

"It was emotionally really touching," says Mr. Kang. "Before the 20th century went way, I had to make a statement, a bridge to the future."

His installation, "Amazed World," displayed at the United Nation in New York City in 2001, expanded this idea with contributions by children from more than 125 countries. In a letter to children he wrote "Hello, I would like to gather all of your dreams for the future and show them in one place so everyone can see! What is your dream? I am very curious about how you imagine your future, the future of the world."

The thousands of drawings he received for the project, and still receives, had a particular resonance on the morning of the opening for "Amazed World" - Sept. 11, 2001.

"Children's vision is very clear, simple - they want peace," he says. "A child's drawing is a small window - if you stand far away you can't see. If you stand close to the hole, you see everything. I have to really listen to them. Our generation needs to make a tiny vision really big. We don't have a future without children. We cannot rely on ourselves; children are our only hope…the Princeton piece is part of that."

 

 

=============================================================
Town Topics, Feb. 4, 2004

Library Artist Seeks World Language Student

Editorial department

 

 

 

Artist Ik-Joong kang invites Princeton students who are native speakers of one of the 54 world languages spoken in households in the Princeton Regional School district to contribute to the 30-foot mural he is creating for the new Princeton Public Library.

Students in kindergarten through grade 12 are asked to write the word "library" in their native language or sprite on a three-inch square paper using ink, crayon, maker, painter, or any material other than pencil. The paper should also include the name of the language, but not the country in which it is spoken, written in English.

Mr. Kang also welcomes submissions of the word "library" written in English, as well as original artwork on three square papers. As accompanying sheet of paper should the name of the student and his or her school and grade. Both sheets should be placed in a single plastic sandwich bag and Saturday, Feb. 21.

Selected entries will be mounted on three-inch blocks of wood and incorporated into the mural, titled "Happy World," which will contain about 5,000 small, square paintings by the artist.

According to the Princeton Regional Schools, the following languages are spoken as native tongues in the homes of Princeton students in the district: Afrikaans, Akan, Amharic, Arabic, Armenian, Ashanti, Burmese, Cantonese, Catalan, Creole, Haitian, Czech, Danish, Dutch, Flemish, French, Ga, Georgian, German, Greek, Gujarati, Hausa, Hebrew, Hindi, Hungarian, Italian, Japanese, Korean, Lithuanian, Mandarin, Norwegian, Polish, Portuguese, Quecha, Romanian, Russian, Spanish, Slovenian, Swedish, Tagalog, Tamil, Taiwanese, Telugu, Turkish, Ukrainian, Urdu, Uzbek, and Yoruba.

Mr. Kang prefers that the world language projects that the world language project be child-oriented, said Jeff nathanson, the library's art project manager. However adults also may submit an offering, and all will be delivered to the artist.

Mr. Kang, 43, was born in Cheong Ju, South Korea, and moved to New York at age 24, where he now lives with his wife and son. His work is widely exhibited, including exhibitions at the Whitney museum of American Art in New York, the museum of Contemporary Art in Los Angles, and a 2001 work, "Amazed World," which included 34,000 children's drawings from 135 countries, displayed at the Untied Nations.

 
============================================================
Princeton Packet, Feb.3, 2004

Library Mural will be Multilingual

By Editorial Department

 

 

 

Upon discovering that over 50 languages are spoken in Princeton, artist Ik-Joong Kang has decided to capture the town's international flavor in the mural he is designing for the new Princeton Public library.

Mr. Kang invites Princeton students in kindergarten through grade 12 who are native speakers of in households in Princeton Regional School Distric to write the word "Library" (without quotation marks) in their native language or script on a 3-inch-square paper using ink, crayon, marker, paint or any material other than pencil.

 The paper should also include the name of the language, but not the country in which it is spoken, written in English.

He also welcomes submissions of the word "library" written in English, as well as original artwork on 3-inch-square paper.

An accompanying sheet of paper should include the name of the student and his or her school and grade. Both sheets should be placed in a single plastic sandwich bag and submitted to the library by Feb.21.

Selected entries will be mounted on 3-inch block of wood and incorporated into the 30-foot mural, titles "Happy World," which will contain about 5,000,3-inch-square painting by the artist.

Mr. Kang visited the library on Jan. 17 to collect small objects submitted by the community for the mural and was impressed by the extent of Princeton's cultural diversity, said Nancy Russell, a library trustee and chairwoman of the library's Art committee.

"When he learned from our committee that so many world languages were spoken natively in Princeton homes, he was delighted," Ms. Russell said. "He was very responsive to ideas that would include this fact about the town's culture and linguistic

diversity."

According to the Princeton regional School, the following languages are spoken as native tongues in the homes of Princeton students in the district: Afrikaans, Akan, Amharic, Arabic, Armenian, Ashanti, Bengali, Bosnian, Bulgarian, Burmese, Cantonese, Catalan, Creole-Haitian, Czech, Danish, Dutch, Estonian, Ewe, Farsi, Finnish, Flemish, French, Ga, Georgian, German, Greek, Gujarati, Hausa, Hebrew, Hindi, Hungarian, Italian, Japanese, Korean, Lithuanian, Mandarin, Norwegian, polish, Portuguese, Quecha, Romanian, Russian, Spanish, Slovenian, Swedish, Tagalog, Tamil, Taiwanese, Telugu, Turkish, Ukrainian, Urdu, Uzbek and Yoruba.

Mr. Kang prefers that the world language project be child-oriented said Jeff Nathanson, the library's art project manager. Adults also may submit an offering and all will be delivered to the artist.

Mr. Kang, 43, was born in Cheong Ju, South Korea, and moved at age 24 to New York, where he now lives with his wife and son. His work is widely exhibited, including exhibitions at the Whitney Museum of American Art in New York; the Museum of Contemporary Art, Los Angeles; and a 2001 work, "Amazed World," which included 34,000 children's drawings from 135 countries, displayed at the United Nations.

 

 

===========================================================
Town topics, January 14, 2004

Community Invited to Help Create Art for New Library

by Susan Thomas

 

 

 

Princeton public Library and artist Ik-Joong Kang are inviting the Princeton community to participate in the creation of a mural for the first floor lobby of the new library, scheduled to open in April.

Kang will be at the library's temporary location in Princeton shopping center on Saturday, Jan.17, from 10 a.m. to noon to meet the community and to collect materials for possible inclusion in the 30-foot- long work titles "Happy World." Kang will speak about the work and answer questions during an 11 a.m. presentation.

 

Small objects from the Princeton community will be colleted to incorporate with almost 5,000, three-by-three-inch paintings created by knag related to the town's past and culture.

"By including contributes personal or historical objects from the community, 'Happy World' will help to generate a friendly and educational atmosphere for the new library," Mr. Kang said.

"And it will function as a bridge connecting many different cultures in the community and enabling the public to envision the future through Princeton's past."

Emphasizing that this project is not a competition, Kang said he hopes to gather hundreds of objects from people of all ages and backgrounds.

 

The public may bring personal, family or historical objects, images, or words for the artist to include. Selected items contributed by the public will be included without attribution. However, a list of all who contribute to the artwork will be publicly displayed.

Those interested in offering printed artifacts, either in the form of a single word, text, form, a letter, or publication, may participate in a community "write-on" wall at the library on the day of the event.

Kang will accept any item smaller than four inches in diameter, except for fragile, musty or hazardous materials. Library volunteers will collect items and mark all contributions with the name of the owner.

Materials included in the final work will not be returned. Those that are considered but not included will be available for pickup at the library at a date to be announced.

Priority will be given to items received on Saturday, Jan.17. However, those who are unable to attend that day may drop their items off at the library before Tuesday, Jan.20.

 

Mr. Kang, 43, lives in New York City. He was born in Cheong Ju, South Korea and Moved to New York when he was 224. He received his mater of fine arts degree from Pratt Institute in Brooklyn.

Kang had exhibited widely, including a solo exhibition at the Whitney Museum of American Art at Philip Morris, New York; a two-person show with Nam June Paik at the Whitney Museum of American Art at Champion, Connecticut; and group exhibitions at The Museum of Contemporary Art, Los Angeles, the Ludwig Museum, Cologne, Germany, and the National Museum of Contemporary Art, Seoul, Korea.

In the Spring of 1997, he was awarded the Special Merit prize in the 47th Venice Biennale.

Mr. Kang's commissioned project is one of seven new artworks being created for the new library. Other artists creating works for the library include faith Ringgold, Tom Nussbaum, Margaret K. Johnson, Katherine Hackl, Armando Sosa and Buzz Spector.

 

The new state-of- the- art, 55,000-square-foot library, at the corner of Witherspoon and Wiggins streets in Princeton Borough, is scheduled to open in April. The library's temporary quarters are in Princeton Shopping Center, 301 N. Harrison st., Princeton Township.

 

 

===========================================================

The Trenton Times, Jan. 18, 2004

Artwork by donation

Bits, pieces arrive for library mural

By Chris Karmoil

 

 

 

A picture may be worth a thousand words, but an artistic vision is worth thousands of pictures to Korean painter Ik-Joong Kang. The 43 tears-old artist who has worked in New York for 20years assembles tens of thousands of 3-by-inch paintings for his murals and installations, shown in museums, galleries and public spaces worldwide.

His latest work, "Happy World," a 10by-30-foot arched-wall work mural, will stand at the entrance of the new $18million Princeton public Library is scheduled to open April 1.

 

"Once we saw his work we just got so excited we called him immediately," said Leslie Burger, Library director. If all art is borrowed art, then Kang's work will truly fit that definition. A collaboration between the artist and the community, it will feature hundreds of donated objects-some of which Princeton locals brought to the Library's temporary space at the Princeton shopping center yesterday-including photos and drawings toys, items found on nature, craft, decoration and symbolic objects.

 

"As an artist, I'm like a fisherman," kang said of collection the various objects. "We cast a fishing rod; scientists bring in the fish; economists chop it up; politicians distribute the pieces. Without the artist's imagination casting the rod, nothing happens."

Kang uses the donated objects whole, or cuts pieces of them to adhere to 3-inch-squre pine blocks. He encases larger objects in clear plastic or attaches them to the blocks with sealants.

"Is this where I bring the stuff?" a woman asked as she approached the folding table where kang and Library workers sat sorting through plastic Ziploc bags, giving the appearance of a major archeological dig.

Kil Jae Park, who works for the Princeton Theological Seminary, brought a picture of his children, dressed in traditional outfits.

"The pictures hold so many significant meaning for us," Park said. "It tells us stories in visual ways. I knew that his work reflects the multicultural world we live in."

"I heard there are 55 different languages spoken in Princeton," artist kang said."

"I hope this mural and installation can be like crossing different cultures and ethnicities."

Kang will use his own found objects and painting on most of the mural's nearly 5,000 wood blocks, which he then adheres to 2-foot-square panels. Those panels, assembled in his Brooklyn studio, will be brought to the Princeton library for final assembly of the story- telling wall.

"There are a lot of walls between neighbors and even countries," kang said yesterday." "By making the wall of art, I believe we can break down walls between each other."

 

Kang's recent work includes a half mile wall of more than 50,000 south Korean children's pictures, entitled "100,000 dreams," assembles under a snaking vinyl tent in the de-militarized zone between north and South Korea. "Artwork has an important power," kang said. "It's a starting point of awareness."

His installation "Amazed world" featured 35,000 children's pictures from 135 countries. It was set to open at the United nations on Sep.11, 2001, but was postponed for several weeks after the world Trade center attack.

 

Kang plans to use 365 donated objects, which the library will collect until Saturday, in his mural. He is one of seven artists commissioned to create works for the new library. Almost $300,000 was appropriated for the art works.

 The other commissions includes a layered fabric wall installation by Princeton artist Margaret K Johnson; a traditional Guatemalan Armando Sosa; hand painted tiles by Lambertville artist Kathrine Hackl; a handmade book including the names of the library's donors by Buzz Spector, chair of Cornell University's art department; a "tar Beach"- inspired mosaic by Englewood artist and writer faith Ringgold; and whimsical figures by Montclair sculptor Tom Nussbaum.

 Many of the nearly 200 items the library collected yesterday were brought by children, but some without their knowing.

"I had to capture my 7-year-ond daughter's sprit," said artist and Princeton resident Eva Mantell as she handed over a pencil drawing of a cocker spaniel in a hula skirt, drawn by her daughter Miranda. She also brought a beaded artwork made by her son, an ink drawing made by her children's great grandmother and one of her own photographs, a "television college."

"It's obviously his unique vision," Mantell said of Kang's mural, but somehow he's allowed people to come into it. I like how it's communal and personal.

 

 

==============================================================

Princeton Packet, Jan.13 2004

Artist invites public to donate artifacts for library's new mural

By Jennifer Potash

 

 

 

A new project at the Princeton public Library offers the public the chance to have a part in the creation of a work of art for the new downtown building, which is nearing completion.

Internationally acclaimed artist IK-Joong kang is creating a mural for the first- floor lobby of the library, slated to open in April.

 

Mr. Kang will collect materials for inclusion in the 30- foot mural, titles "happy World," Saturday from 10 a.m. to noon at the library's temporary location at the Princeton shopping center. He will also talk about the work-in-progress and answer questions during an 11 a.m. presentation.

Small objects collected from the Princeton community will be incorporated with almost 5,000 3-by-3-inch painting created by Mr. Kang related to the town's past and culture. "By including contributed personal or historical objects from the community,

'Happy World; will help to generate a friendly and educational atmosphere for the new library," Mr. Kang said. "And it will function as a bridge connecting many different cultures in the community and enabling the public to envision the future through Princeton's past."

Mr. Kang is one of several artists commissioned by the Princeton public library to create permanent art works throughout the new three-story building at the corner of Witherspoon and Wiggins streets. The others are Faith Ringgold, Tom Nussbaum, Margaret K. Johnson, Katherine Hackl, Armando Sosa and Buzz Spector.

 

The library's volunteer Art Committee, comprising local and consultants, suggested the artists to the library's board of trustees in November.

By viewing the mural, library visitors and patrons may trace Princeton's amazing history and the life stories of neighbors along with thousands of images created by the artist, said Jeff Nathanson, a consultant to the library's art committee. The project is not a competition, Mr. Kang emphasizes. He said he would like to gather hundreds of objects from people of all ages and backgrounds.

The public may bring personal, family or historical objects, images or words for inclusion by the artist.

Selected items contributed by the public will be included without attribution but a list all participants will be publicly displayed. Those interested in offering printed artifacts, ether in the form of a single word, text from a letter or publication or otherwise, may participate in a community "write-on" wall at the library on the day of the event. Mr. Kang will accept any item smaller than 4inches in diameter, except for fragile, musty or hazardous materials.

Library volunteers will collect the items and mark all contributions with the name of the owner. Materials included in the final work will not be returned.

Items that are considered but not included will be available for pickup at the library at a date to be announced.

 

Priority will be given to items received on Jan. 17 but individuals unable to attend the session may drop their items off at the library before Jan.20.

Mr. Kang , 43, was born in Cheong Ju, South Korea, and moved at age 24 to New York, where he now lives his wife and son.

He received his mater of fine arts degree from Pratt Institute in Brooklyn, NY.

His work is widely exhibited, including a solo exhibition at the Whitney Museum of American Art in New York; a two- person shoe with Nam June Paik at the Whitney Museum of American Art at champion, Conn.; and group exhibitions at the Museum of contemporary Art, Los Angeles, and the National Museum of Contemporary Art, Seoul, Korea.

In the Spring of 1997, he was awarded the Special merit prize in the 47th Venice Biennale. Mr. Kang's 2001 work, "Amazed World," which included 34,000 children's drawings from 135 countries, is displayed at the United Nations.

 

 

===========================================================