Translated Vase TVW1,

2015

With her series Translated Vase, Yeesookyung creates an improbable alchemy of form and material. The artist collages fragments of vases—sourced from waste discarded by ceramic artists in Korea—into new vessels with novel geologic and biomorphic forms. The classic blue-and-white and celadon porcelain types joined together here have their own centuries-long histories as highly valued commodities that originated in China and circulated around the globe. Mended with gilded epoxy, the breaks, symbols of pain and rupture, are transformed into points of strength and beauty. Her practice, reminiscent of kintsugi, the Japanese tradition of repairing ceramics using lacquer mixed with metallic pigments, plays on the homophony of the Korean words for “gold” and “crack.”