Courtesy JeeYoung Lee
"I was confused, scared and at a loss, and I used optical illusion to express my emotional state", says Lee. By changing the dimensions of sewing tools, she gave everyday, mundane items a disquieting and almost aggressive air. "I tried to evoke the fear we feel when facing changes to the environment we are familiar with, and also the unforeseen difficulties which may lie in wait nearby," she explains. Lee calculated the proportions and drew the whole set by hand.
Courtesy JeeYoung Lee
The lotus flower represents birth and resurrection in various cultures including in Korea. It is also thought to have a purifying effect, an association which Lee applied to her life: "I wanted to show my personal experience of being born again by overcoming negative elements that had dragged me down, and cleansing myself emotionally," she explains.
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In "Nightscape" Lee used a traditional handmade paper to depict traditional Korean landscapes.
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Seoul-based artist Jeeyoung Lee documents her dreams, memories, and emotions by building thematic sets, and photographing herself as a character on set.
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In the "Meditation," Lee depicted a girl traveling towards unknown destination. "In life, sometimes we stop to take a deep breath and to think of a solution. I wanted to represent that situation through this scene."
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Lee often uses her childhood memories as her source of inspiration. "I've brought the material from my childhood memory of playing with dandelion puffs," says Lee.
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Combined with a black and white color scheme, the installation represents indefinite longing, hope, and purity.
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"There lies a lot of desire in our lives; it's a mix of essential desires that become a driving force of life, and an excessive amount of toxic desires." Through an installation inspired by molecular structures, the artist shows complex and tangled desires spreading out, while placing herself in the middle of her complex web.
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Lee also showcased a video of her destructing the "Desire" installation. She aimed for a pun, since it literally is a destruction of desire, as the title suggests. "The video represents a situation where we have to destroy unnecessary desires in life."
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Lee told CNN that she gets mixed feelings while destroying her months-long work. "I regret that my work is gone, but I kind of feel great because I'm sending my memory back to the past by destroying it."
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For this work, Lee took inspirations from both her childhood and a Korean proverb. Reminiscing the days she used to play with rose prickles, she got an idea from the Korean saying, "Life is a thorny path."
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Lee's take on the "Last Supper" is commentary on competing for resources.
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The flower petals in her work LoveSeek are made of colored Hanji, a traditional handmade paper from Korea.
Courtesy JeeYoung Lee
In this photo, traditional Korean painted fans are arranged to resemble a whirlpool out of which a hand reaches for the rope above. Inspired by the Korean fairy tale of the Sun and the Moon, it portrays a person reaching out for a silver lining.
Courtesy JeeYoung Lee
It took Lee three months to create this magical nocturnal landscape, inspired by childhood memories of holidays spent at her grandparents' farm in the countryside. The grass is made of craft wire, and every single piece is connected to a mesh screen. Recalling treasure hunting games she used to play as a kid, Lee is 'finding a needle in a haystack.'
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"Gamer" is one of the few works that features a model that isn't herself. Lee explains that while some of her works portray different people, the scenes still represent her own story.
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Like in all her photos, Lee's gaze is fixed away from the camera, and she acts merely as a prop in a larger narrative: "If the character looked straight ahead, it would make it hard for the audience to inflict their own emotions on the image," she explains.
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This work, in the shape of a beehive, represents emerging and already exploded rooms of her existing scars and growing emotions.
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Lee placed herself as one of the pieces on a board game, comparing the set to her life of uncontrollable fate.
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By giving herself a pair of butterfly's wings, the artist compared herself to a weak creature in the dangerous, jungle-like environment.
Courtesy JeeYoung Lee
Korean proverb "to hit a rock with an egg" served as the basis behind this image depicting Lee's heartache: "Eggs are so fragile and easy to break, so I felt they would be a poignant contrast to the firmness of the rocks," she says.
Courtesy JeeYoung Lee
Fears and negative feelings are represented as menacing crows bursting through a door in the floor. "For me large birds are threatening, and the image of their feathers, beak, and curved talons is frightening," says Lee. The doors represent future changes and challenges that the artist will have to go through.
Courtesy JeeYoung Lee
At first glance, this image encapsulates the idyllic innocence of childhood. But all is not as it seems, as Lee explains: "The clock is ticking toward midnight, evoking the soon-to-be broken spell from stories like Cinderella, but the girl wants to stay in her comfortable and familiar space. She is unaware that the night sky is cold out the window, and doesn't have a clue about what is waiting for her out in the world."
Courtesy JeeYoung Lee
Lee used paperclips, diminutive objects which bear no threat in real life, to highlight how small worries can compile and turn into a burden we carry through life. The clips, like troubles, are sticking to the figure as she tries to walk away.
Courtesy JeeYoung Lee
Sharp spindly veins seem to be charging toward the pregnant woman in the photo, and the imagery of blood vessels alludes to the inside of a womb. Lee explains: "This work is an expression of my premature self who isn't ready to go out into the world, and it is also a hint at new hope for the imminent baby or possibilities."
Courtesy JeeYoung Lee
The artist tried to express her difficulties in communication with some people through a maze of pipes. "I used yellow and black, as those colors are often seen on signs which warn of danger," she says. The black dog in the corner of the picture represents a person who was troubling Lee at the time.
Courtesy JeeYoung Lee
In this image, over 2,000 hand-painted paper cups are stacked together as bricks of a fragile castle. Lee explains: "I wanted to express the process of heading toward your desire, along with the effort it takes to achieve your dream, which is represented by the star." The glass marbles spread on the floor symbolize fallen stars.

Story highlights

Korean artist Jeeyoung Lee uses her dreams, memories, and emotions as inspiration to build fantasy worlds

Each image, created without digital alterations, takes between two to three months to produce

CNN  — 

Korean artist Jeeyoung Lee creates three-dimensional fantasy worlds. With her background in visual design and photography, Lee captures her dreams, experiences, memories and emotions by building elaborate sets for her ongoing self-portrait series “Stage of Mind.”

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"La Vie en Rose"

In one of her latest works, “La Vie en Rose,” Lee drew inspiration from a Korean proverb, “Life is a thorny path,” and sculpted thorns made out of resin and plaster to represent life’s countless hardships.

“Pretty much anything surrounding me can become a source of inspiration,” Lee tells CNN.

Lee photographs herself as a character in each set and then records their destruction using video. “I could have used other models, but I find it more suitable to model myself since my work is very biographical. It reflects my identity and my life.” Her creations are cathartic, a way to remember and meditate.

Each installation takes Lee between two to three months to produce — from buying supplies to setting up lights — and the cost of each set varies from hundreds to thousands of dollars. Lee works completely solo and her photos are free of digital manipulations.

“This entire process is an act of discipline and training. I wouldn’t be able to experience these emotions through Photoshop.”

Her newest images, which were recently exhibited at the Gallery GO in Korea. Below, Lee discusses her work with CNN Style.

Black and white wartime photos transformed into ghostly fantasies

CNN: Why did you choose to create “a room” to capture your thoughts and memories?

Lee: When we visit someone else’s room, we can guess a lot about that person. A room is an enclosed and private space and my work is about creating a space that represents my psychological state of mind. So I thought characteristics of a room would be suitable.

CNN: Does being Korean influence your work in anyway?

Lee: I guess there would be a subconscious cultural element, since the environment that a person grows up in affects his or her identity. Some of my previous works, such as “Nightscape”, “Resurrection” and “Treasure Hunt” depict the Korean landscape that I saw growing up.

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"Nightscape"

Lotus flowers in the “Resurrection” and flower petals in “Loveseek” are made of colored Hanji, a traditional handmade paper from Korea.

CNN: Why do you favor creating real scenes, as opposed to creating them using software programs like Photoshop?

Lee: The fact that I’m reflecting on real events and emotions that I’ve experienced makes my work real. On the other hand, the fact that the scenes I am creating only exist in my head makes it surreal.

I am creating installations to bring my thoughts into the real world, and taking photos of them to capture a part of my life and reminisce that moment.

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"The Destruction of Desire"

By destructing the scene at the end, I’m putting the moment back in the past, where it belongs. This entire, emotional process is an act of discipline and training for me. I wouldn’t be able to experience this through Photoshop.

CNN: Your gaze is always fixed away from the camera in your photos. Why is that?

Lee: I want people to look at the entire scene, not just the model. Also, by not revealing particular facial expressions, it becomes an indirect expression of my emotions and allows for a wider interpretation of my work. Even though I am a protagonist in my work, I want the person to appear as one of the objects in the picture.

CNN: What is most challenging about realizing your work?

Lee: My installation is a very labor-focused work. So it’s physically hard, and eventually it’s a battle with myself. Sometimes traumatic memories I have with the story I’m recreating disturbs me.

CNN: Tell us about your most memorable project.

Lee: “Anxiety” means a lot to me. It was a very experimental work. I consider the entire process of building a set, taking a photograph, and destroying it, as my work. In most cases, the photograph is the final result, but for “Anxiety,” I exhibited two photographs and a video.

Jeeyoung Lee
"Anxiety"

This work addresses common worries, insecurity, and doubts that we go through in our everyday lives.

In it, a performer makes a strange noise and I’ve cut the sound of the phrase “it’s okay” per syllable, and she reads them as if she’s singing. It sounds very disturbing, but since the work deals with concerns and insecurity, I wanted to deliver those feelings to the audience more directly.

CNN: What is your dream project that you hope to work on?

Lee: I have a lot of projects that I’d like to work on. Since I’m creating different sets inside the studio, there definitely are spatial limitations and there are limitations to the kind of light I can use. I want to work in a really large space, so large that a person will appear as small as a dot. I also want to try building an installation in the back of a truck and move around like a traveling theater.