A Place to Return
A Place to Return
My artistic practice is profoundly shaped by the ongoing experience of geographical dislocation. Relocating from Korea to the United States—a journey across continents and cultures—fundamentally shifted my understanding of “home.” What was once a fixed place became, for me, a shifting and evolving concept, inseparable from the act of movement and the search for belonging.
This ongoing negotiation of transition—both spatial and psychological—permeates not only the themes of my work, but also the materials and motifs I employ. Frequent moves and the ceaseless packing and shipping of belongings have rendered the act of shipping itself into a powerful metaphor for my nomadic existence. Shipping boxes, address labels, and packing materials are transformed in my prints, symbolizing both mobility and stasis, the liminal state of living between worlds while longing for a place to return.
In A Place to Return, I map the trajectory of my life through the addresses found on these packages, designating past American residences as senders and my current Korean address as the receiver. This reversal—returning packages to their origin—becomes a metaphor for my own journey back to Korea and the profound challenges of reintegrating into a society that now feels foreign. The lingering sensation of not quite belonging, of cultural disorientation and rejection, has become a central motif.
Yet this body of work is not only a personal meditation; it also speaks to broader questions faced by immigrants and migrants worldwide. In an era of global trade and cultural exchange, the rights and freedoms of immigrants are increasingly constrained, borders are ever more tightly regulated, and the experience of displacement is more acute than ever.
Through this series, I hope to illuminate these complexities of mobility, belonging, and cultural negotiation. A Place to Return stands as both a reflection of my own story and an invitation for viewers to contemplate the universal search for home, and the shifting contours of identity in a constantly moving world.
