I’m digging these photo-realistic acrylic on paper paintings by Korean-born artist So Yoon Lym. Lym, after moving from Korea to Uganda to Kenya to the US, studied art in Rhode Island, Normandy, and Manhattan before settling in Patterson, New Jersey. Quite a journey, no?

This series of paintings are based of off photos she’s taken in Patterson, and the subject matter arose out of her interest in hair as a means of self-expression and affiliation. Here is what Lym says about the series:

I have a strong interest in hair as a transformative vehicle of physicality.  I am also interested in the associations of hair and hairstyles as indicators of social, cultural, ethnic and gender affiliations.  The interest in urban hairstyles is of particular interest since these hairstyles are unique to a particular social, cultural and ethnic experience that is not my own.  As a woman, I have always been aware of the power of hair.  And perhaps because of the experience of my strict and traditional upbringing, I have never explored the full potentials of my own possible hairstyles in public. Perhaps it is through my paintings that I am able to explore different representations of identity.

via LAEM

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