My work is just a small fragment of that ordinary routine.
Pak Kyoung Yoon lives a near monastic life. He has a regimented routine and works within the same small boundaries every day: The artist wakes up at 2 am – before the grass bugs – and spends his days digging and scratching at wood. He eats three meals a day. There is value in repetition and this repetition is what holds him – and his entire life – together. He is content in his small life – in fact, he believes the whole universe can exist in a bowl or plate. Pak started woodworking while living in a rural Polish town – a practice that helped him endure some of his darkest moments. The artist made himself a guitar using a small chisel, a saw, and a hand plane – and the single note that rung out in the empty silence solidified his future work. The artist pursues an egoless existence. He writes: “I am constantly working to abandon myself. I work according to the day, without a sketch, and am led by the weather and my mental state. What remains of my work is my daily diary. I don't make anything. I’m just living a normal life. Like eating and sleeping, but not thinking about sleeping or eating itself. The beauty of the material of the tree lies in living and breathing. But the important thing is not to be alive, but to die, to self-destruct in nature. The repetition of digging and digging and erasing traces does not produce meaning or thoughts, but erases them. There is truth in constant repetition, daily repetition. It's just that I live from day to day by day. My work is just a small fragment of that ordinary routine.”
