Wondrous Flight

What was initially a little homage to my sick mother unexpectedly became a 16-year run of some of the most conceptually ambitious work of my career. It all started with a simple painting of a blue sky and white clouds to be hung from a ceiling to comfort my ailing mother who lay bedridden for more than a year. My mother would eventually transition in 1995. However, since her passing, the Wondrous Flight installation would take on a new life of its own.

In many respects, this series of paintings broke from convention by radically changing perspectives, processes and presentation. And as a result of incorporating these new techniques and visual aesthetics, my work began to draw a lot more attention. By 2015, over a dozen international museums and galleries had extended offers to host my work.

Wondrous Flight is comprised of:

1. 1. Ceiling Paintings
2. 2. Floor Paintings
3. 3. Visitor Experience

The Inspiration

Seeing my mother lying in her hospital bed was truly humbling. I knew there was little I could do for this wonderful woman who had nurtured me since birth and loved and supported me unconditionally all my life. Clearly, I couldn’t cure her or save her from dying, but at the very least, I wanted to demonstrate and reciprocate my love. I wanted to comfort my mother in her last days the best way I knew how. So, I painted.

Although the intention was for my mother to see the painting on the ceiling from her bed, there was no way the hospital would allow me to obstruct the light in her room. In addition, I wasn’t able to finish the pieces in time before her passing.

Original ceiling paintings inspired by my mother, 1998

Invitation to Rest at Total Museum in Seoul, South Korea, 1999

My mother’s passing had me contemplating life, but more so death, which put me in a very spiritual headspace. During this period, my thoughts were dominated by our individual journeys and how it extends beyond time and space; infinitely and eternally. My goal was to visually represent this transcendence by imagining an existence that goes beyond the human perspective to that of a godly one. This fundamental shift in viewpoint drastically altered my orientation from a limited horizontal humanistic context to that of a more expansive vertical super-powerful one. This new god’s eye view, if you will, began to draw connections between the heavens and earth, man and nature, reality and the sublime.

A Change in Perspective

All of a sudden, looking at a static painting hanging on the wall no longer made any sense. If I were to create a meaningful experience of communing with other worlds, gazing upwards and downwards seemed much more fitting than looking straight on.

By adding to the ceiling paintings a dark floor painting below, I was able to expand the physical space visitors occupied; at least in their perceptions. What further accentuated this drama was the reflective quality of the protective plexiglass overlaying the floor which was superimposed with reflections of the cosmic ceiling paintings above, producing an echoing, reverberating effect which further hints at the idea of infinity, challenging the notion of limitation.

As a whole, the installation felt a lot more visually interesting. Therefore, I adopted this concept which remained consistent throughout all the different permutations of Wondrous Flight.

Shifts in Energy

Along those lines, draping the canvases also started to feel more apropos. Their curved surfaces resembled billowing sails of a ship on a journey from the heavens. The sails appeared to be capturing wind energy, implying movement, making the paintings that much more dynamic. Rather than sitting flat on a wall passively waiting for people to come, the hanging paintings became proactive in their approach of the audience.

Process: A New Way of Painting

Orienting this installation in the z-axis triggered many new discoveries. For example, I came to embrace a new “happy accident” approach to painting.

This process begins by laying down a large—15’ x 8' (96”x114”)—piece of canvas on the floor and drenching it with water. Next, I would douse the canvas with paint. With a large broom, I would then mix the paint colors with the water and spread it out, letting the liquid take its course. Allowing the paint solution to organically mix and permeate produced beautiful unexpected marks. These effects which relied solely on chance would be impossible to replicate using normal brush strokes.

Before proceeding to the finer details, I had to wait until the following morning. When the paint and canvas were finally dry, I used a palette knife and small brushes to draw in the finer, more delicate details of the stars, ships, floor plans, and anchors.

Although this new way of painting was arduous and physically taxing, it was also refreshing, liberating and revolutionary for me.


> Watch Video: Wet Brushing Technique

A Relaxing Experience

As human beings, our earthbound existences have tethered us to our limited tangible realities. Thankfully, the imaginative power of art has the potential to transport us to a higher place. With Wondrous Flight, I wanted to facilitate that by enveloping the viewer in an immersive other-worldly environment in hopes that they could leave their anxieties at the door and be free, at least momentarily, from the heavy burdens of this planet.

Sofas were positioned underneath the ceiling paintings so visitors could lie down on their backs, relax, and listen to music with headphones on to get the full sensory experience. Visually encompassing the viewer with celestial bodies simulated an escape from the earth's atmosphere, soaring upward towards the ecstatic heavens. This was an open invitation for all to contemplate and dream. One could either look up into a vignette of the cosmos or look down at their feet to experience a sense of buoyancy; a lightness in their being. I was very pleased to know visitors really enjoyed this sensation of floating, releasing themselves from the oftentimes oppressive gravitational pull of life on Earth.

Wondrous Flight was not meant to be an escape but a silent refuge into the interstices of time, allowing visitors to resurrect the possibility of finding a better world in the despair and uncertainty following September 11, 2001.

This installation appeared at the following institutions:

1999 Total Museum—Seoul, South Korea

2005 Staller Center for the Arts—Stony Brook, NY

2006 Schneider Museum of Art—Ashland, OR

2006 Triton Museum of Art—Santa Clara, CA

2009 Daejeon Museum of Art—Daejeon, South Korea

2009 Tenri Cultural Institute—New York, NY

2010 National Museum of Contemporary Art—Seoul, South Korea

2012 GALLERY HYUNDAI—Seoul, South Korea

2012 ICA San José—San José, CA

2015 Vessel Gallery—Oakland, CA

View more invidual paintings from this installation in the Wondrous Flight Collection.

Don't forget to check out the Chorus of Trees Installation