Shin Mi-kyung's 10-year artistic evolution on display at AOD Museum

The AOD (Art Of Dalim) Museum is hosting a solo exhibition by sculptor Shin Mi-kyung through February 28, 2027, featuring approximately 200 works. The show marks the first domestic unveiling of the "Megalith" series, which includes pieces from 2021 and new 2026 works such as the "Unknown Painting Series."

The AOD (Art Of Dalim) Museum, operated by the Dalim Cultural Foundation, is holding a solo exhibition by artist Shin Mi-kyung titled “Becoming Stone : From the Remains” through February 28, 2027. This exhibition marks the first domestic unveiling of the “Megalith” series, which Shin has been working on for 10 years, focusing on the trajectory of her artistic world and its evolution over a decade.

Based in London and Seoul, Shin Mi-kyung is a sculptor who has gained international attention for "translating" cultural symbols, such as Western classical sculptures and ceramics, into soap. Her soap sculptures, which gradually wear away in response to the exhibition environment and audience intervention, visualize the temporality flowing through preserved artifacts, disrupting absolute values of authenticity and eternity.

This exploration has expanded beyond the process of "disappearance" to "what and how things remain." Following a sabbatical in 2014, she began researching ceramic media, focusing on the process where clay transforms into an irreversible material upon meeting fire.

The exhibition features approximately 200 works on the B1 floor of the AOD (Art Of Dalim) Museum. The collection allows viewers to observe the flow of her work over the past 10 years by combining major pieces introduced at the Princessehof National Museum of Ceramics in the Netherlands in 2021 with new works from 2026, such as the “Unknown Painting Series.”

This exhibition at the AOD (Art Of Dalim) Museum highlights not the origin of sculpture, but the "way origins are created." The 2026 new works, which orchestrate metallic and corrosive textures, provide an experience of new excavation as contemporary artifacts created in this very moment, rather than mere reproductions of the past.

The “Megalith” series, being introduced to the country for the first time, begins with the chance discovery of fragments within a kiln. Unlike soap, which accumulates time through use and wear, the Megalith series appears as if millions of years of geological time have been condensed at once. Intentional cracks and surface traces evoke primordial human vestiges that transcend eras.

By stacking ceramic pieces that resemble ancient artifacts or mineral masses to create massive rock structures, the works use clay as a material starting point to create an intersection between the forms of archaeological relics and the language of contemporary sculpture. The works in this exhibition reignite questions regarding matter, time, and the perception of objects.

The “Megalith” series began with a single accidental event experienced by the artist. While staying and working at the EKWC in the Netherlands in 2019, Shin discovered numerous fragments left behind by another artist's large ceramic work that had broken during the firing process. These were byproducts of a failed project that never reached its intended form.

“In that place, I did not see the remains of a failed ceramic work, but something like rocks left behind after a massive geological event.” — Artist's Note

The artist's note reveals an attitude that permeates her entire body of work: discovering new forms in unexpected events and viewing them as the beginning of new possibilities.

Rather than presenting a completed form, his sculptures suggest where they originated and embrace various possibilities that may arise during the production process. Furthermore, even after being placed in the exhibition hall, they undergo constant change by relating to the surrounding environment, remaining in a state of continuously becoming something else. In this way, through sculpture, the artist questions what causes things to arise, persist, and change.

This exhibition presents the 〈Megalith〉 series together with the 〈Unknown Painting Series〉, newly produced in 2026. The two series meet in that they both start from the experience of encountering a certain event or material state and translate the possibilities within into another language of art.

While 〈Unknown Painting Series〉 takes on a form similar to painting by being placed on the wall, in the process of Jesmonite and metal powder being applied and layered onto the surface, the surface reveals shapes and traces created by the material itself rather than reproducing a specific image. In that way, the process of accumulation and change fills the screen.

Park Ga-young, Director of Dalim Cultural Foundation, stated, “In this exhibition, we are introducing the Megalith series, which artist Shin Mi-kyung has worked on for about 10 years, to Korea for the first time,” and added, “It will be a meaningful occasion to encounter the artist's new work and a place to more broadly understand the artist's world of work.”

Meanwhile, AOD (Art Of Dalim) Museum is a cultural and artistic space opened as part of the cultural and artistic support from Dalim Biotech, and has been hosting exhibitions with artists of various genres since its opening in 2019.

Read the original (Korean)