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"Two roads diverged in a yellow wood ... I shall be telling this with a sigh somewhere ages and ages hence: Two roads diverged in a wood, and I— I took the one less traveled by, and that has made all the difference."

This is Robert Frost's poem 'The Road Not Taken.' Like the poem, artist Kim Hyun Jung (29) is walking a path with no visible trace of others having gone before. American magazine Forbes described her as "a painter who, through her Korean paintings, challenges established convention — holding a solo exhibition at New York's Metropolitan Museum of Art (one of the world's three great museums) and becoming the youngest artist to exhibit at Korea's National Museum of Modern and Contemporary Art."

That was the explanation given last April when she was named to the '30 Under 30 2017 Asia' list. The list also included singer Jessica, Rio Olympics archery gold medalist Choi Mi-sun, and footballer Son Heung-min. She was also the first Korean pure fine artist to ever make the list.

Artist Kim is known as the 'idol of Korean painting.' Her 2014 solo exhibition 'Naesoong Olympics' at Insa Art Center drew the largest audience (23,887 visitors) in the center's history since opening. Her 2016 exhibition 'Naesoong Amusement Park' drew as many as 5,026 visitors in a single day, for a total of 67,402 visitors.

True to a new-generation artist, she actively communicates with the public through social media, running more than ten accounts across various platforms. Her work can also be found in KakaoTalk emoticons. She continues to actively give lectures at universities and companies. We met with artist Kim.

◇ Korean Painting, Alive and Breathing in Everyday Life

Her trademark is the 'Naesoong Story' series, capturing a hanbok-clad woman engaged in ordinary, everyday actions — a bold departure that shatters the elegant, refined image typically associated with hanbok. Forbes' assessment that she "challenges established convention" is directly tied to this distinctive style.

A woman elegantly dressed in hanbok sits on the floor eating ramen, her gaze fixed instead on a luxury handbag and a Starbucks coffee. Another rides a delivery scooter for hamburgers with her legs fully exposed. At a glance, it's an incongruous combination — different inside than outside, in other words, Naesoong. It melts her own experience of straddling the boundary between the life she wants and the life others want for her. "When people think of Oriental or Korean painting, landscapes and figure paintings usually come to mind. The subject matter was quite limited. I think people have positively evaluated my effort to find new subject matter." Korean painting that lives and breathes in everyday life is exactly the direction Kim aims for.

The Naesoong series, which she began in earnest four years ago, started from the idea of "making paintings that are fun both to paint and to look at." Rather than difficult, stiff paintings, she wanted to lower the 'threshold' of Korean painting with more accessible imagery. "That doesn't mean it's easy to make, though. A single work can take anywhere from two to six months. There's meticulous planning and research behind it, including working out the composition."

Even the backgrounds in her paintings are based on real locations. The model is herself. To achieve the color she wants, she goes through more than 20 rounds of drying and re-layering. She first sketches the underdrawing in the nude. For the top, she attaches hand-dyed hanji to express its distinctive texture, and for the skirt, she uses ink to render it semi-transparent. Revealing the silhouette of the body underneath carries the message that 'you can see right through her.' It's a distinctive encounter between Western-style collage and East Asian ink-and-light-color technique.

◇ An Art Student Majoring in Business: "Why Must Painters Go Hungry?"

Kim majored in Oriental painting at Seoul National University and earned her master's degree at the same graduate school; this year she began her doctoral program. As an undergraduate, she unusually double-majored in business administration for an art student. Business administration, a popular major with high demand, requires fairly high grades to add as a double major. Moreover, having walked the path of art since childhood [portion illegible due to faded scan]

Her interest in business administration stemmed from curiosity about the art market. "I was curious why painters have to go hungry, but no one could tell me. I studied business administration to try to resolve that question, even just a little." Learning an unfamiliar field also broadened her view of the world — she realized how fiercely people in fields outside the art world were also living. "For large lectures, you had to arrive an hour early just to get a front-row seat [portion illegible due to faded scan] her conclusion was this: "There's no denying that you go hungry, but I learned that a diligent artist can at least eat as well as an office worker. Someone once said to me, 'Do you know how hard office workers work?' Artists who work that hard don't live in poverty either."

◇ A One-Person Startup: "I Want to Open a New Path"

[Portion illegible due to faded scan] came out and got a good response. Within eight months of launch, it sold nearly 40 million won worth of product. Combined with her painting sales and lecture fees, her annual income is said to be comparable to that of a large-company employee.

Her use of social media, with more than 100,000 followers, is connected to Kim's goal of 'art that reaches the public.' In contrast to the conventional image of an artist keeping their distance from the public [portion illegible due to faded scan] there's an atmosphere in the Korean art world where artists are expected to always stay humble and modest, rather than openly and actively promoting their work. "The work I put out is like my own child. If you're a parent, isn't it natural to speak proudly of your children?"

◇ Painting Like a Resonant Bell... An Artist Who Breathes Together With Society

Her passion and deliberation over painting, her 'main job,' are endless. She commutes to her studio six to seven days a week, all while pursuing her doctoral studies. She can count on one hand the days off she takes in a year. "I rest only when I genuinely feel like I might collapse. Picasso's paintings are astonishing, but he also lived with tremendous intensity — he painted about 13,000 works in his lifetime. Nothing in this world comes for free."

She also gives back to society what she has received. With a particular interest in education, Kim donates scholarships to her alma mater to support the next generation. She also volunteers at an orphanage once a month and provides financial support. "At first, I started by donating necessities like formula and diapers. But I came to realize what matters more is giving the children love. There are so many children in our society who are truly starved for affection."

Asked about her future goals, Kim said, "I want to continue engaging in activities that consistently give back to society." "Bringing happiness or laughter to people whose emotions have grown numb, through social media — in the bigger picture, I think that's also a form of volunteer work. I want to keep being someone who isn't bound by convention and keeps changing, just as I am now." Like a chameleon, one can't help but be curious how she'll surprise the world next.

Written by Oh Yu-gyo, jobsN, jobarajob@naver.com, jobsN