SOMEDAY, NOW, ALWAYS

Chinatown Soup is pleased to present Someday, Now, Always, an exhibition of paintings by Soup Studio resident Clare Kim on view at Soup Gallery October 4-16, 2022. Please join us for an opening reception on Thursday, October 6th, from 7-9 pm.

At first, Clare mainly used magazine clippings for her collage-turned-paintings. While in residence, Clare drew from her archive of personal photos to create visual diaries that weave together referential images, consolidating distinct moments and cherished memories on canvas in a dreamlike manner. 

This juxtaposition of objects, at once familiar and disjointed, transcends linear storytelling and invites viewers to reflect on their own experiences through symbolic life forms. For Clare, oysters and martinis from the bar next door join bottles of Tabasco sauce, Korean playing cards, and impressions of Danny Devito, merging the everyday with the universal. Inhabitants of these subconscious planes are variegated yet cohesive, floating together across a soft shock of ombre palettes, reminiscent of what we see when we close our eyes. 

While Clare’s work features several motifs, such as food, animals, and a unifying magenta background, human hands appear in every piece of this series, interacting in the frame and providing an anonymous intimacy. These are not the hands of strangers; they belong to people in the artist’s life and yours. When we reach back into a memory, what do we touch?

Clare Kim (b. 1996, United States) is a Korean-American painter based in Brooklyn. She is self-taught, and Chinatown Soup is hosting her debut solo exhibition.

Artist statement:

In my paintings I create stories by weaving together different elements from my memories and personal history. I often find it difficult to stay mindful of the present and am drawn to dwelling on the past or attempting to predict my future. This disconnect from the here and now scrambles my sense of time and consolidates my memories in a dreamlike manner that transcend linear perceptions of time. 

I collage images from these distinct yet disjointed moments in my life, starting with the same bright magenta base layer that I like to think of as the color of my inner world that ties everything together. My paintings are intimate vignettes of my life, acting as diary entries out of order, recollections of memories happening all at once. In one still frame, I converge years’ worth of memories and dreams into the present moment — to be appreciated here and now.