Space travel in pastel psychedelia
So Youn Lee’s gender-neutral protagonist, Mango, accompanied by Choco, a French bulldog sidekick, leads us on journeys through candy-coloured galaxies adorned with rainbow bubbles, eyeballs, and stars. But this is more than just a transcendent experience. Lee is inspired by her experience as an immigrant in the U.S. Her paintings are a metaphor for encounters of the self and strangers, and ordinary life as well as the hardships. Through Mango’s wide-eyed curiosity, Lee reinterprets these challenges as adventures worthy of exploration.
Lee's paintings immerse us in an alternate universe brimmin...
Bio
So Youn Lee (she/her) was born in 1984 in Busan, South Korea. She currently lives and works in Los Angeles, USA.
At auction
So Youn Lee's piece, Mother, was purchased for HK $125k (US $16k) at Christie's HK 2020 Modern & Contemporary Art sale, over the painting's HK $120k upper estimate.
Collaborations
In 2018 Lee designed a unique edition of trainers for Aldo's Mx3 Artist series. Her signature twist was the doodle patterns on the shoes that glowed in the dark.