Kim Minwook: On Carving, Bending, and Binding Wood @ Asian Art Museum

Kim Minwook (b. 1978, South Korea) works with wood shaped by weather, time, and nature. Attentive to his raw material, Kim responds to the grain, tension, and movement already present, and allows cracks, knots, or scars to inform the work, thus carrying forth the life of the tree into sculpture. “The wood itself is an active presence,” says Assistant Curator of Korean Art Yoon-Jee Choi, “not simply an object shaped by the artist, but a collaborator.”

Kim’s adventurous approach to his medium is on full display in his first solo museum exhibition, On Carving, Bending, and Binding Wood. A self-taught craftsman, Kim discovered his passion for woodturning in 2013 and earned swift recognition, receiving the 2019 Lexus Creative Masters Award in Seoul, and shortlisted for the 2022 Loewe Foundation Craft Prize. Kim continues to reimagine contemporary craft through a practice grounded in listening to material, time, and the quiet narratives held within wood.