‘Time’ is almost always followed by the verb “to flow.” Yet at times, we find ourselves seized by the impulse to pause time—if only briefly—and keep it close, lingering beside us. Sometimes, we want to cut into the grain of a past moment and look again at its cross-section. Gallery Belle Vie’s curated exhibition The Garden of Time is for such moments, and for those who carry them.
Yun Jong’s paintings begin “from the life of memories buried deep within.” Memories in which warmly lit homes and people with dramas of their own intertwine are rendered not as mere scenery, but as a medium through which we come to see everyday time anew. Keeping a deliberate distance from the busy, fast-paced world outside, the artist fills the canvas with an analog sense of time and space.
Ha I Kyoung captures and paints “the traces of time stayed, and the imprints of emotion” within fleeting scenes that are easy to forget. She does not hastily judge what she sees. Instead, in quiet contemplation, she gathers the subtle movements of the heart and holds them on the surface. By setting aside exaggerated emotional turbulence and revealing a calm stillness, her works offer viewers a gentle, lingering consolation.
A “garden” is a carefully cultivated space—an area made and tended by planting flowers and trees, filling and shaping a corner of life. In October, as the breeze turns cool and mild, we invite you to wander through The Garden of Time, nurtured by Yun Jong and Ha I Kyoung, and to encounter landscapes of time in bloom—where inner images and lived reality cross and intertwine.
