Experts describe the psyche as a fusion of conscious and unconscious material, fluidly combined to compose our sense of self and the reality around us. Artist the trap of AhnHis compositions materialize this process: internal psychological and emotional landscapes that are formed through multimedia paintings that echo the construction of the often dark layers of subjectivity.
Ahn’s last show, “nocturiarecently opened at Chicago’s DOCUMENT, marks a significant evolution in the artist’s practice. In just a few years, his work has undergone a gradual refinement of its symbolic language, with a growing sense of world-building that now extends beyond painting as a single medium. engagement with each work, processing each element with care “My process is very intimate. I often hold the work while painting, almost like cradling it. There is a sense of closeness from the beginning.”
Although he comes from a traditional painting background, he began to feel constrained by only oil on canvas. He constructs his frames and panels, shaping them beyond the edge of the canvas and adding other elements that extend each composition into physical space. “That process evolved: some frames remained traditional, others widened the edges, opening the image to the outside. Gradually, the work shifted visually,” says Ahn. In recent times, scales have been made mostly in real sizes – not in miniature, not monumental, but in accordance with real objects and lived sensations.
During our conversation, Ahn identifies a major turning point—his father’s illness and death—that profoundly affected his emotional state and, by extension, his work. As often happens, grief became a catalyst for artistic creation and he began to shift both visually and materially, adopting more experimental approaches to articulate increasingly complex emotional states. “His illness got progressively worse, and of course, that affected my practice. I was emotionally charged every time I did a job,” Ahn explains. “The work became more experimental because I was looking for ways to fully describe my emotional state.”
This is manifested in the exhibition in the presentation of digital media, elegantly integrated within the canvas itself in The four seasonsto expand her narrative. “Video allows me to express emotional states more fully, especially after my father’s death,” he says. “The painting remains central, but I needed something more.” Featuring video fragments recorded by the artist over three years of travel and daily life, the work plays forward and then rewinds in an endless cycle, finding in the passage of time and events a value beyond any illusion of finality of consequence. It is a powerful metaphorical reflection on what it means to hold time and move through it.
Although Ahn’s work remains primarily figurative, it is strongly informed by a subconscious dimension that allows him to stage elegies on the meaning of life. The video component seems to allow a form of surrender to its non-consequence flow, as Ahn pushes beyond the self-contained image, opening the work to a more expansive narrative field. At the same time, fragmentation, remnants and interruptions are an integral part of the structure of his work. Ahn’s lexicon is now one of the relics of everyday life—ceramic vessels, stones, candles, and personal items that accompany the transitory nature of everyday moments—appearing here broken or suspended. “They hold unknown histories, and that ambiguity fascinates me,” he notes, adding that he has a deep interest in how fragments, like artifacts in museums, survive.
“I’ve become more interested in fragmentation and questioning what constitutes a ‘whole.’ I relate this to life—the way things wear out or break down over time,” reflects Ahn. Coming from a tradition of still life, his earlier works focused on flawless and perfect objects. Now, that calm, undisturbed perfection appears as an illusion that cannot really exist, not even on the canvas. “Back then, my life was simpler and I hadn’t experienced much disruption, but as I encountered more complexity, the fragments started to make sense visually and conceptually. They fit what I’m trying to express.”
However, there is also a constant effort to reassemble these fragments into an uncertain unity. His works suggest a fragile balance, something momentary, always on the verge of dissolution. Both in their structure and in their symbolic vocabulary, they recall the tradition of vanityconfronting the impermanence and impermanence that characterize human existence. Motifs such as butterflies and dimly lit white candles make this idea of transience clear. Indeed, most elements in his work remain deliberately legible, with no hidden symbolism. “They are everyday objects that open up to broader existential meanings,” Ahn explains.
Importantly, Ahn is not illustrating emotions. Instead, he works at the threshold where the emotion has already become a symbol. His material fragments, embedded within these assemblages of free association, function as liaisons between bodily feeling and symbolic form—metaphorical portals through which an inner language is accessed.
As the title suggests, these works often inhabit fleeting moments: dusk, dawn or sunrise, suspended atmospheres that further reinforce an elegiac symbolism of permanence. “I experience time through my studio routine—watching the sun set, then the moon rise as I work late into the night. The night offers a quieter, more introspective space,” shares Ahn. Each work becomes, for him, a condensed version of his studio environment—his memories, his mindset, and his environment. “They are dense objects that embody that experience.” Portals to the subconscious and, at the same time, physical embodiments of it, they crystallize a moment within an otherwise relentless emotional flow.
Ultimately, his works emerge from a constant balancing act of control and surrender. Images emerge in his mind and are transferred to the canvas, where emotional impressions find symbolic form, yet the structural and hand-crafted elements require careful planning and execution to come together within the whole. “Some aspects are planned, especially the structural elements, but most of the process is intuitive,” he explains. “I rarely end up with something identical to my initial idea, but I usually prefer what comes out of the process. I start by building the canvas in my wood shop, setting up the scale first. Then I go through the layers—background, objects, or abstraction. I’m in control, but I’m also collaborating with the materials.”
Looking ahead, Ahn expresses a desire to further expand his artistic language by incorporating new materials while maintaining painting as its core. For him, this expansion represents a form of linguistic growth, aimed at fostering deeper connections with the audience. “It’s like becoming multilingual – every material expands my vocabulary,” he says. He admits he’s still processing his father’s death and that it will continue to shape the work, while also hoping that, over time, that pain may gradually give way to something else.
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