Max Yoon (Jung Nam Yoon)

Jung Nam Yoon was born in Korea in 1944. Early in life, he was fascinated by art. With the understanding and support of his mother who also loved art, he was able to study painting. At the same time, he was also fond of music. He organized a band and gave many musical performances. All forms of art have something in common, influencing the other forms of art mutually and causing synergy. For this reason, he was able to paint and play music at the same time, even though he was often constrained by lack of time in a day.

After graduating from college, Yoon had to choose between these two loves and decided on a career in music. He performed as a Jazz musician on the stage of the 8th United States Army for 12 years, and played the bass for Pattie Kim, a famous Korean singer. However, in1975 he suffered a serious injury to his left hand in an accident cutting short his music career. He then returned to his other love, painting. His past activities with music has such considerable influence on these paintings that some people have said that they “feel the soft jazz music in his paintings.”

Yoon had often envied those families in which descendants succeeded their fathers in a family business. Much to his delight, his younger son announced to Yoon that he had made up his mind to devote his life to drawing. Yoon was quoted as follows: “I am very aware that life as a painter is not easy at all. Nevertheless, I felt like leaping with joy because I can help him as a father and a mentor in the future.”

Yoon’s main interest is gardening. His reasoning is found in the next quote: A garden is an artificial space which men make in an attempt to create nature in their possession. It might sound strange, but I regard artificiality as an action of human’s searching for the long lost nature. This is because nature around us was deprived of its substances a long, long time ago. Accordingly, I want to capture the following thing in my drawings: the green world we long for, the intensity of the wild nature, the peaceful touch of light and the warm world of life by using the garden as a subject, even though it may be transformed and artificial. Indeed, I would like to convey my message to others that the world still has hope and a lot of beautiful things.”

Exhibits -International Art Expo (Jacob K. Javits Convention Center): 1999, 2000, 2001, 2002

-International Art Expo (Florida): 2000

Max Yoon