GEUNDEOK PARK_danchung artist

That day, I saw an elephant and came back I was on my way back after seeing the procession of countless elephants in Pinnawela, Sri Lanka. Suddenly, heavy rain poured down, and the world turned dark. Easter in April 2019, Sri Lanka was tragically stained by sudden terror. Amid the carefree water play of elephants who knew nothing and the scene of terror, I became an innocent elephant. The tension between those who seek to harm and those who seek to protect, represented by the boundary line, is like the red and blue colors I divide. Even within the subtle conflict of this boundary, my organized breathing, guided by restrained proportions and conceptual space, disappears along with resignation into the brush strokes accumulating. At that moment, I felt the boundary between the bright and the dark, the sad day of Sri Lanka turning from light to darkness. Inside the gestures of the elephant that seemed infinitely pure, all I wanted was to disappear. As I prepare for my solo exhibition in 2023, I reminisce about those mysterious elephants. (Annotation - The Pinnawela Elephant Orphanage was established in 1975 by the Department of Wildlife Conservation of Sri Lanka. It is located near the Mahaweli River in southern Kandy and spans approximately 25 acres of coconut groves. It serves as a sanctuary for around 90 elephants, mostly young ones that were abandoned, injured by poachers, or had health issues.)