Curatorial Statement

That Someday

A More Three-Dimensional Present 

“Every being exists only once, just once, and never again.
We, too, are only once, never again. Yet this—this once-happened fact,
though only once: that we were on Earth, is irrevocable.”
— Rainer Maria Rilke, The Ninth Elegy, from Duino Elegies

The fleeting nature of existence makes each moment profoundly beautiful.
Things that pass quickly are often the most pure and sincere. Though they disappear, traces remain—like a stroke of ink on paper, or a passing mark that stains the fibers of fabric, enduring in memory.

To imagine the layers of time buried beneath the skin of a city is to excavate the present rebuilt atop the ruins of what has vanished—and to confront the hidden truths embedded there. From the city she inhabits, Heo Ju-hye witnesses a landscape in symbiosis: past and present, decay and renewal, nature and civilization interwoven across layers. Within the city's historical timeline, some structures surface and assert themselves, while others silently circulate through a subterranean ecosystem. Fragments of earth, sand, and metal cross through ages, reborn each time in new forms. Buildings rise or collapse, forests emerge or fade away—each following its destined cycle, originating in nature and returning to it.

Relics of Someday

Heo’s canvases are present-tense records of “that someday”—reflections of both origin and legacy. Through remnants of what once existed and fantasies of what may remain, she captures a richly dimensional now. When she visited Suwon Hwaseong Fortress years ago, its walls felt like boundaries between worlds. From such memories, Heo imagines the density of time residing in various urban spaces and objects—time stretching from antiquity into the present, and the weight of memory it holds.

Her subjects range from buildings and ruins to artifacts and natural features. In earlier works, she was drawn to the overlooked urban details: hidden pipes, obsolete mailboxes, air conditioning units tucked in the shadows. These unseen mechanics inspired empathy and guided her understanding of the city’s ecology as layered and organic. Her focus gradually expanded toward deeper historical forces—those embedded in relics and ruins.

Sometimes the humblest things survive and become artifacts. The present, by nature elusive and ungraspable, often gains its future value precisely through its own ephemerality. A small Paleolithic hand axe, spotted in a museum, reemerges monumentally in Standing on one leg (2025)—a quiet testament to an anonymous gesture from prehistory. On canvas, Heo subverts the physical relationships between objects. In Fragmentation (2025), a towering urn and a stone haetae sculpture evoke mythic presences, gazing over the world with deep gravity.

With each additional stroke and each deeper saturation of ink, the subject grows stronger—revealing the inner life of objects that have endured countless layers of time. In Heo Ju-hye’s ink-based practice, every fleeting mark settles beneath the paper like a buried relic. Once absorbed, it lingers like an afterimage beneath layered washes, eternally revealing its trace. Like the substructure and base of a construction site, like the sedimented history beneath the earth’s surface, and like a past that sinks ever deeper as the present piles on—those initial strokes remain faithfully preserved in the invisible depths.

Silent Margins

In Standing on one leg, four canvases are joined in a grid, with two irregularly shaped panels placed at the bottom. Each of these forms resembles a fan—its corner softened into a rounded arc. With their curved edges facing outward, the entire composition evokes an inverted arched window. This upended form hints at a precarious balance, as if slipping along gravity, amplifying the surreal atmosphere of the interior world it reflects. By integrating supple curves into the contours, the painting escapes the conventions of a rectangular frame. The omitted segments become pockets of poetic resonance, inviting quiet reflection in the spaces left unsaid.

Contemplation arises in silence. Freed from the noise of everyday life, the possibility of reflection whispers to those who pursue truth. At the heart of Heo Ju-hye’s recent work Looking Up (2025), a vast crater-like void offers no clear directive, allowing anything to be sensed within its unknown stillness. From the weight of its emptiness arises the breath of meditation and the womb of creation. This vacant space becomes a metaphor for lost records and forgotten memories—an evocative quiet that opens infinitely toward the unknown.

A similarly vacant central space appears in Feather (2025), where the surrounding terrain—shaped like feathers—reveals mountain ridgelines densely replaced by high-rise buildings instead of trees. This composition offers two perspectives: one reflective, contemplating a world built atop dismantled nature; the other, a neutral gaze that reminds us human cities are also part of nature’s ecosystem.

This latter view withholds judgment, observing the present of a landscape where nature and civilization have become intricately intertwined. Even concrete structures erected on felled forest land—man-made forms crafted from minerals and wood—remain, at their core, bound to nature. And nature, though shaped by human hands, refuses to be fully tamed. It reclaims its place through cracked walls, scorched ruins, and forgotten urban voids, continuing to sprout in its own quiet way.

 Drawing the Present

“Perhaps we are here simply to say: house,
bridge, spring, gate, jar, fruit tree, window—
and maybe: tower, column.... But to say them,
in ways that things themselves never dared to say.”
— Rainer Maria Rilke, The Ninth Elegy, from Duino Elegies

The present, built upon materials that have survived countless moments, becomes a crossroads of memory and renewal. In her Gentle Gaze series (2023–2024), Heo Ju-hye reveals stark contrasts in density and time among the canvas’s elements. A palace, rising in dignified form at the top of the painting, is rendered in a delicate outline, as though traced from distant memory. Surrounding it, stone mountains, pagodas, steles, and Buddhist statues are layered with dense textures, creating a vivid counterpoint that guides the viewer’s gaze downward—into a forest of intricately woven light and shadow.

Her compositional method is intuitive. She begins with large subjects and fills gaps with smaller elements—early additions emerge in the foreground, while later ones sink into layered depth. Artifacts appear from above, recalling Heo’s own gaze into museum glass cases. In contrast, towering buildings are painted from below—reflecting the view of a grounded observer. Perspective and brush tone are constantly rearranged, offering a multifaceted present seen from many angles.

Perhaps the meaning of impermanent existence lies precisely in the present moment.
We are here only briefly— to speak on behalf of landscapes and objects that cannot speak. With touch and voice, we testify. We name the present in our own language—and sometimes preserve it as a relic for the future. We become acutely aware of the surrounding landscape—the very panorama of the world, already a relic of someday. This is an attempt to perceive, from a more dimensional view, the scenes shaped by things moving through the endless now and the accumulated traces they leave behind. Because each person’s perception of the present is uniquely their own, every history becomes deeply personal—and above all, creative.

- Miran Park (Curator, Deputy Director at Arario Gallery)

Heo Juhye

juhyeib@naver.com | @heo__juhye

Education

2016    M.F.A. Oriental Painting, Chungbuk National University, Cheongju

2014    B.F.A. Oriental Painting, Chungbuk National University, Cheongju

Selected Solo Exhibitions

2025    That Someday, OCI Museum of Art, Seoul

2022    Only, Space Sieon, Jeonju

2021    Holding on, there, Hakgojae Art Center, Seoul

2017    Mount, Cheongju Art Studio, Cheongju

Selected Group Exhibitions

2025    All Drawings, Cheongmundang, Daegu

Re:Art Project: Forms of Yesterday, Gaze of Toda, Suchang Youth Mansion, Daegu

2024    Fragmented Algorithm, Daegu Art Factory, Daegu

2024    Mobility–Smart Young Art, EXCO, Daegu

2024 The Art Plaza, IBK Arcade, Seoul

Flexible Interstices; Shadows of Gaze, Daegu Art Factory, Daegu

A Piece of cake, Gallery JY, Seoul

2023    Narrative Painting, Topohaus, Seoul

2022    the language between, Danwon Art Museum, Ansan

Re; Side, Suwon Art Space Gwanggyo, Suwon

2022 Suwon Cultural Night, Hwaseong Haenggung, Suwon

2021    Art Village 3!1!5!, Studio White Block, Cheonan

Jeonnam International Sumuk Biennale, Nojeokbong Art Park Museum, Mokpo

Awards / Honors

2024    Selected as 2025 OCI YOUNG CREATIVES, OCI Museum of Art, Seoul

2022    Selected for GGC Art support program, Gyeonggi Cultural Foundation, Suwon

2021    Selected for Exhibition support program, Chungbuk Cultural Foundation, Cheongju

Residency

2024    Daegu Art Factory, Daegu

2022    Suwon Art Studio PRJD, Suwon

2017    Cheongju Art Studio, Cheongju