Since time immemorial, creativity and melancholy have worked in tandem in a peculiar way: madness causes the arts to soar, while despondency draws them downward. Duerer’s prominent engraving Melencolia I comes to mind. Is it only a contact with the depths of the soul that gives rise to artistic genius? On the other hand, depression as a modern, clinical diagnosis of mental illness is anything other than productive: gloomy and listless, its sufferer spends day after day in bed.

In her works, the Korean artist Miran Yang gives shape to the various manifestations of psychological pain. Despite the heaviness of the themes, her manner of painting is remarkably light: delicate brushstrokes; simplified, even playful chalk drawings — here a blossom, there an earthworm. Yang creates a pictorial world that responds seriously to the memories of childhood. Not infrequently, the causes of psychological suffering are to be found in this period of a person’s life.

Miran Yang (*1984) lives and works in Frankfurt am Main. In 2021, she completed her studies of Fine Arts at Städelschule. She is a stipendiary of both Atelierfrankfurt and Künstlerhilfe Frankfurt. Currently, her works can also be seen at Kunstverein Erlangen, the ADAC Collection, and in the Frankfurt offices of the Dentons law firm.