Interview with Jinyoung Kim
Wanda: So how did you start making art?
William: Yeah give us an intro about yourself
Jin: When did I become an artist?
William: Like when did you-
Jin: Start?
William: Yeah start, like what was your journey to get here
Jin: I started making art since I was really young but I specifically got into photography when I was in high school. At our high school we had this camp, they sent us to this remote place in Ontario because I went to school in Ontario with a bunch of art kids basically. They had a darkroom in there. So I basically camped for two weeks, maybe a little more and then I got to work with film cameras and darkroom process which was really new at the time and it just really captivated me. So I continued into OCAD university in Toronto and did my BFA, and my undergrad works are really different from what I do right now but I think everyone kind of identifies with how that can happen. I was also really interested in staged photography, like portraiture, a lot more narrative based portraiture-
William: Was it still on location photography?
Jin: Yeah I went to places and photographed people in certain narrative scenarios. And then I went to Montreal for MFA studies at Concordia. That’s how I ended up in Montreal. After I graduated- because when you’re in the program you get a studio space in the EV building as an MFA student and then after that you get kicked out because first and second year are coming. So then I was looking for a studio space and I actually had a studio space in the Belgo building for awhile, about six months. That was a very different arrangement from what I have right now with painters and sculptors so it was very messy and there was a little more flexibility in what I could do with the space. But I decided to move out of the space, it was too expensive basically. I was straining my budget a lot keeping my studio there, I did make a lot of work there but I had to find another option. That’s when I found this other option in RCA because actually three of my colleagues are part of it already in the space, so they asked me if I wanted to be part of it since they knew I was looking for a studio too. Which now it’s one third of the price than keeping that in Belgo and I could be with these artists that are like minded and we share the space. It’s been already four years.
William: Did you look at the studio before?
Jin: Yeah, of course
William: Was there something about it that just made you go like “Yes this one”
Jin: I think a lot of artists when you’ve gone into a certain amount of years working as an artist you accumulate a lot of work, you’ve got lots of prints, lots of framed work that can’t always sit in your apartment. So you kind of need to find an option for storage space. Then there’s also the idea of having an office or meeting place for potential exhibitors or curators that want to come and see the work so I was basically looking for that kind of space. I wasn’t really working with anything that was sculptural based or anything that was studio based at the moment so that was sort of my goal in terms of making this ideal space work for my practice. Basically the place was really clean and we have this very well compartmentalized storage system that we built together, we divide sections depending on our usage. But it’s mostly the people, like the people who were already part of it I was ok with being with them, a group of artists that I think I identify myself with that kind of work.
Wanda: So do you feel there’s a sense of community by sharing this studio with them for so many years?
Jin: Yeah I would say we don’t meet regularly as studiomates. I mean for the business of the studios we maybe meet twice a year. We meet all the time outside of the studio space. They’re in the same milieu, they’re all photographers, they’re all artists, they work with me at Concordia so they’re colleagues. We are meeting all the time, so I think the sense of community organically comes from just being around each other all the time.
Wanda: So taking it back to when you were leaving the Belgo building, what were your initial considerations for the studio you were looking for?
Jin: I guess the first option was to find somewhere that was cheaper, it’s hard to find the place that’s something you can imagine yourself there and working. Mostly as a photographer having a lot of daylight coming in is very important. We have two windows in two corners, the white wall is kept clean. We do need a place to potentially shoot, I haven’t yet! But maybe in the future and I know that one of our studiomates uses that wall as a studio space quite regularly. So those kinds of things were important.
Wanda: So was there any changes to those plans? Seems like it was a great thing
Jin: Yeah in terms of better the storage space we have a good system and I feel like I can always talk with my studiomates without feeling… because they’re my friends I know they would always do their best to negotiate. So it’s that supportive environment that’s more of importance in my case. Also being part of the community is a huge thing, without overtly being like we don’t schedule regular studio meetings it’s more being connected through the space. It bonds us together as artists together and we feel a responsibility to each other, towards the space. Another thing is when you’ve been out of school, you’ve been in a community for quite awhile it can get quite isolating. It’s scary when you just get released to the world like ok just go make art. Go find a studio space with total strangers and do stuff. It was quite intimidating. To be part of this after graduation was helpful to continue with the practice emotionally and psychologically.
William: We talked a little about it but how does the organizational structure work? Like how do you organize your work?
Jin: The production process for me is; bringing the work into the studio means it’s finished to some degree. The work needs to be printed, shot, made and executed. Then we bring it to the studio and we talk about it. So in that term, the process doesn’t really exist visibly in the space. It’s more if I’m doing administrative work.
William: I also meant the organizational space that you built, like how does it work?
Jin: We built shelves with pieces of wood and the storage space we share with seven people, that’s a lot but we each have our space. The workspace is really open, there’s some desks and we keep it all clean all the time. The storage space we have multiple shelving systems like; this section is Jessica, this section is Jin, this section is David. So we divide it. But we don’t have a very rigid system where everyone gets two shelves. We’re kind of flexible with how much storage space that you require. We’re all at a very different point in our career so the accumulation of work is quite different. Jessica for example has been practicing a lot longer than I have been so she has a lot work, she needs a lot of space. So we try to support as much as we can to have a lot of room for her and then I have maybe a medium sized space. If I have a plan of having more work coming into the studio then I can just talk to them and we figure it out, we build more shelves or we find a solution together.
Wanda: Your practice, where does it mostly happen? It’s a process so it happens in multiple spaces but do you have a recurring space that you go?
Jin: Yeah it’s at Concordia, the Post Image Cluster. There’s a Post Image Lab upstairs on the tenth floor (EV Building) and they have printers, scanners, viewing stations. So everything you to print and post produce I do it there. For shooting It’s mostly based in South Korea which is on the other side of the planet so I have to take the plane for thirteen hours just to get there. Most of my work has been from there, or in Toronto. I recently shot something in Montreal for the first time so my work is starting I hope to take place more and more in Montreal because it’s expensive to fly all the time. Somehow that’s been my practice.
So a lot of it is outside, outdoor shooting. My work has a lot to do with place and how place is related to your sense of self, how the space itself accumulates meaning for you and how that meaning that’s from your past affects your present. Also to do with your process of recollection and memory, your identity; personal identity, and cultural identity. So those are things I look at in my work so I have to go to places to produce work that’s in context to what I’m looking for. Potentially it could happen in Montreal but it hasn’t happened yet.
Wanda: So the space that your doing the shooting, it holds emotional value to you? Does it affect the images you take?
Jin: Yeah definitely
Wanda: Do you want to elaborate on that; a Toronto shoot versus a South Korean shoot, how does the place influence the image?
Jin: As a photographer, you know photography is about somehow being engaged with where you are at a point in time but at the same time to be able to shoot something that’s interesting and not just on the surface level you have to know about the place. Have some sort of relationship with the place’ with a space or the person. You kinda have to go beyond what’s on the surface to be able to take a picture. In that term I think to be in a place where I have a lot of memories or where I have a lot of my sensory memories; have objects that trigger this process of recollection it’s very important because that’s when you see something beyond what’s in front of you. When you shoot a picture in that place it’s not going to be the same than if I was walking in Paris taking pictures of pretty architecture. I would be looking for something very specific that has something to do with something I remember, something that I read, longed for when I was away from there. Looking for something really specific about that place that other people don’t necessarily see. So I think it’s really important to be in that place. Most of the comments about when I do meetings about my work and communicate my work being oriented in South Korea or Toronto where it’s not Montreal where I’m presently at, there’s some comments ‘Ok why can’t you do this here? You can totally do this here’ I think that’s the most disagreeable thing, ignorant comment about this idea of art making in relation this sense of space. This same thing cannot happen here because I don’t have the same context. Doesn’t make sense to me. But on a surface level especially about my recent project which was about Gentrification, not only about Gentrification but if you want to put a label for the subject of it or the topic of it, it covers the topic of Gentrification in relation to my personal history around the place. So they’re like ‘oh there’s so many things happening around Griffintown, why can’t you do something there’
William: It’s because there’s no personal relation there
Jin: Yeah I wish I could do that but I never lived in Griffintown!
William: That project on gentrification is it shot in South Korea and in Toronto?
Jin: No in South Korea only. So it was on neighbourhoods, particularly on a style of architectural buildings, it’s like a residential concrete apartment buildings that are outdated so they’re demolishing all of that generation of the residential complexes to replace them with high rises. Replace them with better newer buildings. I mean these buildings aren’t made to last a hundred years because they were mass produced and the materials are cheap and it was from the 70’s so it was fated to be disappearing. But then there’s people who grew up in it like myself who are attached to that style of architecture, the particularity of the design or material. I’m going back to document all the disappearing buildings around Seoul that started from documenting my own former neighbourhood but then I’m sort of expanding on that. A lot of things involve travelling, shooting outside, and now I work a lot in making video now. Video is a whole other beast. You have to rent gear, hire people, go to sound editing suites and sit with a sound designer to work with the mixing. So these things are always taking me outside of the studio, I have to meet people or shoot people on location. A lot of times being in the studio potentially means that you’re making these production trips, your trajectory of production is always outside of the studio but when you come back to it you process the whole steps, make decisions for your work. Series of decisions are made in the production stage too but as a director of the project or something so this is an important place to make some final decisions
William: If you could change one thing about your space, what would it be?
Jin: I think it could be messier. Now I’m sort of trying to want to work with objects and be hands on so I want to make a corner where it can be a bit more free than really clean floors and no paint on the walls. So I’m trying to make a fabrication area where I could do things.
Wanda: When you were building your studio space did you have any inspirations? Did you look at other artist spaces?
Jin: Yeah, yeah I actually do because I’m not coming from sculptural or hands on practice so I’ve never had a studio that’s stationed and then you’re making stuff. So sometimes I go to my friends’ studio and hang out and see what they have, they have all these tools and like pieces of wood they’ve got accumulating all the time. Basically a lot of inspiration comes from my artist friends’ spaces.
William: To go off on that, do you think you work better when things are really really tidy or when things are more messy and chaotic?
Jin: I think tidy. When I said my studio here I meant it could have more stuff and still be organized. I need to have some systems in place to have some organization.
Wanda: What do you use the most in your studio?
Jin: Storage space!
Wanda: And when you’re travelling and your studio is across the world, what do you use the most then? Besides your camera
Jin: Notebook, my Laptop, Sound recorder, bottle of water! It’s important
William: Got to stay hydrated
Jin: And a pen.
William: I know you said that you don’t really meet up with your studiomates often but do you feel that it’s more productive or easier to work when you’re surrounded by other people being productive or?
Jin: No I have to be alone. So I think this space works because even though we’re a lot of people sharing it no one’s in the space at the same time. We get to have the space alone if we want to. The work itself has to happen alone.
Wanda: Do you find that when you’re working the space stresses you or does it relax you?
Jin: If I’m alone it’s relaxing, if I have someone else in the space I might not want to be there! You’ll see because in our space we don’t have any walls, it’s one big open space.
William: It’s interesting in another interview we did it was a musician and a writer who share an apartment together and are a couple and the musician doesn’t want anyone to listen to anything he does until the very end and the writer doesn’t mind being surrounded by people and is more exhibitionist with her work so it’s interesting to see you say that too since like you don’t have the walls and people could maybe hear you or bother you
Jin: That’s so interesting usually it’s the opposite in temperament, musicians are always projecting sound
William: Yeah it was a little weird, it’s because he likes experimenting so he’ll play something 40 times so he doesn’t want anyone hearing those 40 times he wants them to hear the 41st time when he gets it right
Jin: I think I’m kind of the same way, I would just show something that’s almost finished to get feedback from someone else. I would have to be involved in the work up to a certain degree and then open it up for other people’s involvement so I’m a bit of a control freak in that sense
William: I’m exactly the same. For my portfolio this semester I basically brought my finished portfolio I was like here you go!
Jin: For the midterm?
William: Yeah I had six prints already and I asked him if I needed to do anything and he was like no. So, yay!
Jin: I guess it’s a different level, or style of working
William: Universally what do you think is a must for any studio?
Jin: I think a desk
William: I thought you were going to say storage space!
Jin: A desk is essential yeah, and walls to put some stuff on and look at. You always have to look at what you’ve done. And Coffee.
Wanda: If you were to give recommendations to people who are looking to build a studio space, what would you recommend?
Jin: I mean the space has to work you, it’s not like you’re working for the space. So you get a studio when you really need it. Maintaining a studio space is a lot of work in itself, even though I’m not really there you always have to negotiate with who you’re sharing. Lot of logistics, have to clean it up regularly. Also expense is a big thing as an artist you don’t make much money and you sort of have to think about if it’s sustainable to you in that term. You need to consider how much space you have versus how much space you need in terms of producing your work, also where your studio is located in relation to where you live. You don’t want to be too far away. You want access to the shops you go to or the galleries that you’re affiliated to. I think the most important part is who you’re with. I think it’s really important to consider who you’re with and what kind of work they do because it will have a lot of impact on you. If you have a good relationship with your studiomates that’s already a good artistic community that you already have. If you’re constantly exposed to the work of your studiomates and you like it, it’s important I think you have another place to get inspired. You’re there to see each others process and it’s really valuable
William: Considering your working process doesn’t really include the studio, what made you think ‘oh I need this separate space outside my apartment’?
Jin: As an artist it’s really easy to overwork, you’re working all the time. You’re reading, you’re thinking, constantly thinking about your work and you need to take a break sometimes and home is sort of where you do other things. So to be away from the living space in your workspace is important to have that balance between work and life. Also when you do have a meeting with a curator you can’t always bring your portfolio with you when you’ve got a big framed work. It’s also nice to have space to exhibit and show the work in a proper condition and it’s becoming more and more important for me to have that. It’s to at least have that turn off space in your apartment.
