LEFT Woomin Kim, Shijang: ChungGwaMul, 2022, quilted fabric and mixed media, 56 × 57 in. Hood Museum of Art, Dartmouth: Purchased through the Contemporary Art Fund; 2024.5.
"Shijang: ChungGwaMul"
JAYDE XU, Hood Museum Board of Advisors Mutual Learning Fellow
Shijang: ChungGwaMul (fruits and vegetables) is a quilted still life of a fruit and vegetable market stand. Shijang (시장), meaning "market" in Korean, are hyper-local, and every shijang has a specialty for which it is known, whether regional produce or a particular dish. Because each stall at the shijang is individually owned and run, shijang function as community centers and public forums, particularly for a middle-aged and older Korean population.
Woomin Kim was born in Busan, South Korea, in 1986 and received her BFA from Seoul National University in 2012 and her MFA from the School of the Art Institute of Chicago in 2015, where she studied sculpture. The Shijang series began in 2020 during the COVID-19 pandemic's quarantine: Kim, a self-taught quilter who learned sewing from her mother, was without studio access and took to the medium for both its versatility and its more flexible demands for space. Because this series of works was born during the pandemic, Kim was attuned to the heightened stigma against East Asian people and culture at the time, and specifically the villainization of street markets as unclean and dangerous spaces by the general American public.
"Fabric is like air, it's everywhere." —Woomin Kim
Kim sources her fabrics from a mix of reused materials and the collection of new textiles: she sources her materials from donations from friends (since they know she's working on quilts), local arts upcycling organizations, and trips back home to Korea. Typically, the construction of one quilt takes anywhere from three to five weeks, depending on its size and complexity. The quilt is made in separate sections before being arranged into a composition—a process that parallels how shijang vendors carefully curate their goods and stalls to draw customers in.
In her exploration of the shijang, Kim continually returns to the observation that shijang directly reflect and respond to the needs and attitudes of their local constituents. Within Kim's larger practice, the Shijang series perpetuates her interest in the stories objects tell and how to describe a culture and way of life through its objects alone.
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