Ken Gun Min
LOT 13
Brilliant sadness eats your soul, 2024
Korean pigment, oil, embroidery thread, crystal and beads on canvas
80 x 60 in
Courtesy of the artist and Nazarian / Curcio
Suggested retail value: $44,000
Starting bid: $30,000
About the Artwork
Ken Gun Min’s paintings explore intimacy, masculinity, and representation across cultures, employing a mixture of Western-style oil paints, Korean pigments, embroidery, and beading on raw canvas. Often featuring nude and queer-coded men, his portraits and lush landscapes concoct fanciful idylls where longing, melancholy, and euphoria manifest beyond the expectations of daily life. Born in Seoul, Min lived in San Francisco, Zurich, and Berlin before settling in Los Angeles; drawing on this experience of Eurocentric capitals, his practice calls first-world-oriented perspectives into question. For the past several years, Min has focused on the creation of cross-cultural figures and spaces by integrating Eastern and Western painting styles on a single plane. This practice investigates the way figures and landscapes can be colored by the material and stylistic choices made in their rendering. In both his technical application and the scenes he composes, Min challenges conceptions of sexuality, gender, and race, especially as they are depicted in Western art history. Min’s solo exhibitions include The Last Paradise, MCA Denver; Silverlake Dog Park, Shulamit Nazarian, Los Angeles; Wounded Man, Hard-boiled Wonderland and the End of the World, K Contemporary, Denver; and Becoming Palm Tree, Gae Po Project Space, Seoul, Korea. Min has been featured in group exhibitions at Craft Contemporary Museum, Los Angeles; Utah Museum of Contemporary Art, Salt Lake City; Torrance Art Museum, CA; Albertz Benda, New York; 1969 Gallery, New York; M+B gallery, Los Angeles; and Harper’s, East Hampton, NY. Min was a Hopper Prize finalist and has received awards from Direktorenhaus, Berlin, and the Kellogg Foundation, New York. He has a solo exhibition forthcoming at Denver Art Museum in 2025.
HOW TO BID:
Bidding is available from May 19-June 6.
1) Text 'READY TO BID' or call 628-279-6010.
OR
2) Visit the Headlands Auction Exhibition to see the artwork and bid via pencil & paper.