Kyungmin Kate Lee

My cyanotype practice explores memory, endurance, and the physical experience of time through material and spatial decisions.

The small wall-mounted cyanotype cube is based on medium-format black-and-white photographs taken on Nanaimo Island in 1995. The island marks a pivotal turning point in my life—a site connected to departure rather than arrival. I translate this memory into a modular form, treating the cube as a condensed spatial marker rather than a narrative object. Positioned beside the larger work, the cube functions as an anchor point, quietly holding a personal origin within the exhibition space.

The larger cyanotype work reflects the accumulation of time spent living here—mentally and physically navigating persistence, change, and resilience. Imagined movements across oceans, waves, and mountains inform the work, allowing natural phenomena to function as metaphors for lived experience. While each life unfolds differently, we all carry a unique sense of time shaped by where we have been and how long we continue to remain.

I work with cyanotype on parchment paper to foreground material behavior and memory. Its oil-resistant surface initially raised doubts about whether the cyanotype solution would absorb, yet this resistance produced unexpected textures and granular effects. Its durability in water and subtle elasticity also allow for precise finishing when mounted on canvas or wood panels. Through this process, material properties become inseparable from personal history and spatial experience.

Kyungmin Kate Lee is a Korean-born multidisciplinary artist based in Canada. Working across photography, sculpture, and multisensory media, she engages both film and digital processes while extending photographic practice into tactile and embodied forms. Her work examines how time, perception, and meaning are produced through duration and lived experience rather than visual representation alone. Integrating tactile strategies, sculptural structures, photography, and video, Lee treats accessibility as part of how perception is structured and resists quick visual consumption. Through translation, repetition, and attention to duration, her practice explores how identity and experience accumulate over time, reflecting ongoing inquiries into diasporic identity, language, and the body.

Contact the artist directly for information on purchasing.

Contact: kyungminkatelee@gmail.com
Website:
IG: @kyungminkatelee

May 6th to May 17th, 2026
918 Bathurst Street, Toronto
Sun and Star Rooms

Hours: Wednesday - Sunday, 12pm to 5pm
Opening reception: Thursday May 7th from 6-9pm
Artist talk: Saturday, May 9th from 1-3pm