Kim Do is a New York artist, focused on an observational, painterly connection to the earth, water and sky. Trained in the modernist tradition, Do incorporates abstract expressionism, interaction of color, figure and ground exchange, and a keen awareness of space in his paintings. Do paints with a full range of tones, taking the eye up, around, and beyond the painted surface, searching for what is, and what could be. The work has the freshness of being in nature.
His love for painting began at age three, inspired by housepainters who had just finished his parents’ living room, to crayon a huge orange circle on the new white wall. Growing up, he was often making things with his hands, repurposing carriage wheels and empty shoeboxes. For Do, art is a process of bridging the gap between the interior self and the exterior world. He enjoys the challenge of painting landscapes en plein air (outside). “I enter into an altered awareness, circumventing the second-guessing of the conscious mind. One enters into a flow state, watching oneself paint a painting. Despite the physical challenge, the exigent race against time, there is an effortless quality to the making.” In his paintings, Do hopes the viewers will be transported into the scene, feeling the breeze, the light, the time of day, and the weather.
With studios in New York City and the Catskill Mountains, combining technique with nature, he often paints just 200 feet from the porch of his Catskill Mountain home, where the West Kill and the Schoharie Creeks meet. “The landscape evokes childhood memories of growing up near the East River in New York City, as well as feelings about my family and living along these ever-moving bodies of water.”
Born in New York City in 1954, he earned a BFA degree from SUNY Purchase and an MFA from the University of Pennsylvania. Kim Do teaches, and has been chair of the Visual Art Department at Horace Mann School in the Bronx. Do’s works are in many notable collections including headquarters of Citibank, Japan Long Term Loan, American Express, and Reader’s Digest.