Yoon Ji-Eun laureate of the 2019 DDessin prize

What is interesting about DDessin, a drawing fair celebrating its 8 th edition, is the number of young artists who show on their own. Of course, the star this year is Korean artist Yoon Ji-Eun, whom I had spotted at Drawing now 15  years ago. I love her work on plywood or paper and her galerist Maria Lund has always supported her heartily. She won last year the DDessin Prize and is therefore the main attraction this year. Margaux Derhy who embroiders paintings and Clovis Retif who draws waste and accumulations of objects, were my two other choices. And of course, I was happily surprised by novelist Tahar Ben Jelloun‘s works in acrylic on paper at gallery Art Absolument. 

Yoon Ji-Eun, “A mon étage”, (on my floor) 2017, courtesy Yoon Ki-Eun and galerie Maria Lund Paris

Born in 1982 in Korea, and trained at Ecole des Beaux Arts in Paris, Yoon Ji-Eun won a scholarship to study in Senegal at the French Institute of St Louis. Besides the coloring, burning and sculpting of plywood, she also draws on paper. She often represented is in the work as a small and discrete silhouette, and has recently introduced geometric elements and more color.

“A Sunday morning”, 2013, courtesy Yoon Ji-Eun and Galerie Maria Lund, Paris

An alumni of the Royal College of Arts and the Central Saint Martins school in London, Margaux Derhy has spent some time in South Africa where she learned how to embroider. She shows a series of family portraits and friends which are part of “Mémoire Vive”. Her recent studies have concentrated on memory and science, curing traumatisms and recollecting family memories. Her paintings in embroidery become stronger as yo watch them. I was surprised at how much I liked them.

Margaux Derhy, “Mémoire vive”, embroidered drawing

Next to her was a French artist, Clovis Retif, who lives in Brussels and will soon move to Tuscany. He concentrates on collections of objects and waste. After his series on contemporary solitude, where he focused on bathrooms, he now draws large compostions full of objects either in antique stores or on the street. His drawings are close to photography and are quite disturbing.

Clovis Retif, “Des-Compositions”, graphite pencil, 2019

DDessin is open until Sunday night 20 September or you can contact the artists and galleries directly afterwards.