[Winter 2025]

Uprooted, Taking Root
by Gabrielle Sarthou

The Montreal artist Jinyoung Kim’s exhibition Here¹ brought together photographs, videos, and sculptures that challenge the sense of “being at home” in the context of life-changing personal and family displacements. These themes – being uprooted and finding new roots – have been central to Kim’s practice since she began her art career in the early 2010s.

Who hasn’t, at least once, been welcomed to a new living space by things abandoned by the previous occupants? Haven’t we all looked at them, picked them up, felt their heft? Haven’t we all envisioned those people’s lives swirling around these items, and their movements, of which there remain just a few scratches and stains? Haven’t we all imagined the final slamming of the door on these things, which are left behind and quickly forgotten? In Apparitions (2024), Kim stirs up these memories with a sculptural installation formed of a grouping of ghostly objects – pieces of drawers, headboards, table legs, cast and molded in drystone – that arouse a sense of déjà vu. This work prods us to ask ourselves, what things do we leave behind? What do other people do with those things?

  Translated by Käthe Roth

[ Complete issue, in print and digital version, available here: Ciel variable 128 – CHANGE OF SCENE ]
[ Complete article in digital version available here: Jinyoung Kim, Here – Gabrielle Sarthou, Uprooted, Taking Root]

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Born in South Korea and raised in Canada, Jinyoung Kim is a graduate of the Ontario College of Art & Design (Toronto) and Concordia University (Montreal). In her images and installations, she takes inspiration from her own experiences to reflect on issues such as identity and sense of belonging. Her works are in museum and corporate collections, as well as that of the Ville de Montréal. She received the Lynne Cohen Prize in 2019 and is a member of the photographic collective Outre-vie/Afterlife. She is represented by Galerie Patrick Mikhail in Montreal. jin-young-kim.com

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