All of these issues are now clashing with the idols of Kpop and Kmovie celebrities, who become aspirational models for the new generations, partially representing freer lifestyle, while embodying specific biopolitics that still rule on an ideal of perfection.
The result is therefore a strong social pressure, especially geared towards younger generations. Dew grew up surrounded by Christian literature and lessons, but as a shy, lonely child; Dew often fantasized about biblical stories and discovered sides of them that relate to broader human behaviors and inclinations.
A place where American consumerism and advertising morosely meets and mixes with religious extremism. The result manifests into icon fueled capitalism and strange billboards that lead you either to paradise, or hell. Dew began to study English there, but he felt a similar pressure as in Korea in a community of Mennonites, who shared the same rigid approach to religion, and life, as the environment where he was raised.
After some time, he started to escape to Chicago on weekends. Then he finally moved to NYC, where he began meeting like minded people and explored more freely and fully the uncharted imaginative realms of pleasure, and art. It comes with nor surprise, looking at his work, that this was actually preceded by a BFA in Metalsmithing and Jewelry from Konkuk University: this peculiar combination in educational backgrounds allows Dew Kim a special approach to sculpture, that results in extremely refined metal structures enriched by sophisticated multimedia elements or surfaces and details that reconnect them to the body.
In this way, the creation of objects becomes more performative, as the work represents the body in one form or another. However, as it often happens, religions share many key values that prove how they were, since the beginning, a tool to educate and instruct people.
