The Image Centre celebrates photographer Jin-me Yoon and Korean culture in Canada

The Image Centre (IMC) at Toronto Metropolitan University (TMU) is hosting Jin-me Yoon’s first solo exhibition in Toronto. The installation of both her new and earlier lens-based works is a celebration of the artist’s illustrious 30-year career, which has seen her art presented in more than 200 exhibitions worldwide.

Born in Korea and raised in Vancouver, Yoon resides on the unceded territories of the Coast Salish peoples of the Musqueam, Squamish and Tsleil-Waututh Nations. Often inserting herself against the backdrop of various landscapes, she uses photography, video and performance to position her personal experience of migration amidst unfolding and ongoing historical, political and ecological conditions. With this exhibition, Yoon demonstrates that Korean culture can be created both in Korea and across the diaspora in this ever-evolving globalized world.

“My work always deals with time. The past shapes the present, and how we think about the present shapes the future,” says Yoon. “We are moving towards greater inclusivity. Yet at the same time, there are other forces trying to shut us down; there’s a lot of strife in the world, a lot of extremity, whether it’s due to the climate crisis, war, or forms of xenophobia and racism. So even though my work is not documentary, those kinds of concerns have always been at the heart of my practice.”

Yoon is the 2022 winner of the Scotiabank Photography Award, the largest and most prestigious peer-nominated and peer-reviewed award celebrating outstanding contributions to contemporary art and photography. For 12 years, the winner of the annual photography award has received a solo exhibition at the IMC during the Scotiabank CONTACT Photography Festival.

This year, the Korean Cultural Centre Canada (KCC) provided additional support, allowing the IMC to include more of Yoon’s exceptional photographic art.

Moonsun Choi, Senior Advisor, Exhibition at the KCC notes, “An internationally recognized Korean Canadian artist, Jin-me Yoon has accomplished much throughout her artistic career. Her winning of the prestigious Scotiabank Photography Award and her resulting exhibition at The Image Centre proves that she is a great asset to our two countries. Yoon not only plays a role in connecting the two countries, but also broadens our perspective by bringing in rather complicated discourses in a subtle way. The Korean Cultural Centre will continue to support Korean Canadian artists who strive to bridge the two countries with their endeavours.”

Paul Roth, Director of the IMC, notes that since the 1990s, foreign government support for art created amongst diasporic communities has dwindled. “So it’s really fantastic to see the investment of the Korean diplomatic mission in Canada for people from the Korean diaspora. We’re really honoured to have their support.”

Choi adds, “This year marks the 60th anniversary of Korea-Canada diplomatic relations. For the past six decades, Korea and Canada have enjoyed a closer relationship in every sense, and cultural partnerships have been the backbone of our relationship.”

“Diasporic Koreans are Korean, and Korean culture is both here and there at the same time,” says Yoon. “It’s an honour, and I’m happy that the KCC can support a major exhibition of mine.”

Roth adds, “Jin-me is a particularly collaborative artist, extremely thoughtful and deliberative about her work, and so it was really a joy for us. Her artistic energy had gone to a very good place at this point of her career, and she wanted to showcase recent work. So we switched gears from what we’ve done in the past and supported her in producing new prints — and for us that’s very special and distinct.” Roth further notes, “Also making this body of work special is that after a tidal wave of racism was unleashed during the pandemic against East Asian people, she’s done really interesting work that raises questions about how we are all implicated and impacted.”

Earlier artworks in the gallery include Yoon’s A Group of Sixty-Seven (1996), which references 1967, the year Canada’s revised Immigration Act removed race-based barriers for accepting immigrants, and which challenges the Group of Seven and Emily Carr, whose paintings represented Canada as a vastly uninhabited land. The piece displays portraits of Canadians from the Korean community, including Yoon’s mother, Chung Soon Yoon, and her late father, Myung Choong Yoon, whose memory lives on in his daughter’s art.

Yoon’s newer works include reflections on the psychic effects of war, and never-before-seen photographs of her crawling on a moving platform at various sites around the world, providing a “worm’s-eye perspective” of Japanese colonialism, American imperialism, European high modernism and Canadian settler colonialism. 

“Art doesn’t just reflect the world, it creates and reimagines it. Art is essential,” says Yoon. “It’s part of how we try to work together towards a transformation that’s positive and raises everybody up rather than being divisive.”

“Even amidst the weight of the exhibition’s themes, visitors will be surprised by the humour in Yoon’s work,” says Roth. “It’s very rare to find complex, conceptual, contemporary art that is welcoming and open-hearted. And because she has a wonderful sense of humanity and a wonderful sense of humour, the work conveys that and that will delight people.”

The Scotiabank Photography Award’s top prize also includes $50,000 and a book of the artist’s work (external link) , published by the renowned German photography book publisher, Steidl.

The Scotiabank Photography Award: Jin-me Yoon exhibit (external link) , organized by The Image Centre, is presented by Scotiabank in partnership with the CONTACT Photography Festival, with additional support from Partners in Art, Superframe and the Korean Cultural Centre Canada.