Interview:Sunik Kim_English edition
_Thank you so much for agreeing to this interview. To begin, could you please introduce yourself?
I was born and raised in Seoul, South Korea. I clearly define myself as a photographer, yet I’m interested in challenging all the boundaries and definition.
_When did you first decide that you wanted to become a photographer? And how did you begin your career in photography?
I don’t think there was a decisive moment when I decided I wanted to become a photographer. To be honest, I wasn’t that serious about photography when I first started.
In my late twenties, I bought a small mirrorless camera for the first time in my life and began taking pictures casually, almost as a hobby. That was the very beginning of my journey with photography. Before that, I had never imagined myself becoming an artist or a photographer. I tend to act on things as soon as an idea comes to mind, without thinking too much about it, and I think that tendency played a part in how I got started. I had a vague image of what being a photographer was like, shaped by what I saw in the media, and my attitude was pretty casual. I just thought, “It would be nice if I could take pictures and make money doing it.”
Naturally, I had absolutely no idea how to start a career as an artist. I didn’t know where or how I could exhibit my work, or who I should show my photographs to. So I decided to make a book on my own. I had never studied design before, but I taught myself how to use Indesign and made my first book. Through that process, I began to define myself as a photographer. This was in 2019.
_I see, that's interesting. Listening to your story, I get the impression that it all started with buying a camera, and that you gradually found your way toward becoming a photographer through different experiences along the way.
What I find particularly interesting is how you made your own choices and took action throughout that process. Teaching yourself design seems like a perfect example of that.
So, what was it actually like when you made your first book? Did you struggle a lot with the process?
To be honest, I had no understanding of design at the time. For me, design was more about editing images, selecting photographs and arranging them. I knew absolutely nothing about typography. I was almost completely ignorant of it. I remember looking for a sans-serif typeface that felt universally acceptable and using it for both the cover and the inside pages. But even before I started making books, I already enjoyed arranging and sequencing images. When I’m taking photographs and when I’m editing them, I try to become two completely different people. When I’m editing, I try to put aside my ego as a photographer as much as possible.
I don’t think I’m the kind of person who struggles to choose between one thing and another. I tend to make decisions quickly, and even when things don’t turn out well, I’m usually able to accept the outcome. I take the experience as a lesson and move on to the next. In that sense, the hardest part of making my first book wasn’t so much the design itself, but figuring out how to distribute and sell the publication afterward. I had gone ahead and made a book, but no matter how much I talked about my work, not many people seemed interested. Most people didn’t even know I existed as a photographer.
_So, it sounds like you kept moving forward through trial and error, taking one step and then another. Do you think that understanding your own personality — your ability to make decisions quickly and not dwell too much on things — has helped you keep moving forward?
You also mentioned that, in the beginning, you struggled to get people interested in your work and to find ways to distribute your books. But now, some of your publications have sold out, and you're even considering reprinting them.
I'd love to hear more about that journey. What kinds of experiences or encounters helped you get to where you are today?
I think it’s important to take enough time to think things through before starting something. Of course, I also go through that process before putting my thoughts into action. But if it takes too long, it can end up limiting yourself, so I think it’s good to find your own balance.
The cold indifference I faced after making my first book wasn’t pleasant, but I thought there must be a reason for it. And on the other hand, if a particular project receives attention, there must be a reason for that, too. With these thoughts in mind, I continued working on a new project(Temporary Garden), and in the spring of 2023, I had my first opportunity to hold a solo exhibition. I started preparing for the exhibition six months in advance, staying in close communication with a team that was in charge of the design. Over the course of the exhibition, which lasted about a month, an unexpectedly large number of visitors came to see the work, and the response was positive. I felt a little bewildered by all the attention, because it was the first time since I started making work that I had experienced anything like it. After that exhibition, I began to rethink the scope of design. I realized that I shouldn’t see design simply in terms of image editing or typography.
The first exhibition came to a successful close, and afterward, I started receiving inquiries from various places from people who were interested in the project. I think that was how I gradually began to make myself known as a photographer.
_When you faced indifference from others, rather than simply accepting their reactions, you tried to understand the reasons behind them. I find it very interesting that, after going through that experience, you received such a positive response to Temporary Garden.
I've spent some time looking at the photographs in Temporary Garden. Generally, a "garden" is understood as a place where nature is managed and organized by human hands. But what I find particularly interesting about your photographs is how they capture nature intruding, breaking through, and forming unexpected connections and entanglements.
At the beginning of this interview, you mentioned that you're interested in "challenging all the boundaries and definitions." I feel that this attitude is very much reflected in Temporary Garden.
With that in mind, could you tell me a little more about what "challenging boundaries and definitions" meant to you while working on Temporary Garden?
Clearly defining myself within the medium and genre of photography while also wanting to blur all boundaries and definitions sounds quite contradictory. And the term “boundary” is too broad. I’m still trying to understand what it means, even now. A boundary could be the one between the inside of a house and the street outside, or it could be the one between my inner self and the outside world surrounding me. I think what I saw in Temporary Garden was a kind of flexibility to define and give shape to something on the one hand, while challenging those very definitions on the other. That flexibility gave me hope, but it also brought despair because it was something I could never quite get my hands on. In that sense, what I’ve learned through making the body of work is to accept my own limitations as they are. For me, this is also what it means to accept nature to recognize that there are things we can never fully understand or control.
_Listening to everything you've shared so far, I get the impression that you're trying to understand yourself while also challenging various boundaries and definitions, using photography as a way to explore and express these ideas. To me, this seems to reflect a certain attitude toward how you engage with society.
At the same time, we live in a society where we constantly define and categorize things. Both individuals and society itself are full of contradictions, and things don't always turn out the way we expect or hope.
In such a society, what does the "flexibility" you discovered through Temporary Garden mean to you? And are there times when you find it difficult to maintain that flexibility?
There's one more thing I'd like to ask. Continuing to challenge things while also accepting your own limitations — I feel that these two attitudes can sometimes be contradictory. How do these two ideas connect with each other for you?
Rather than choosing one side between two opposing values and insisting that one is right, I tend to try to embrace both. This attitude can also be reflected in the work. For example, it appears as a way of accepting or attempting to transcend the limitations of the medium of photography. you can imagine two separate areas divided by a wall, with a secret passage built into it so that you can move freely back and forth between them. You define something, challenge that definition, and repeat the process. I’m not sure whether this can be called embracing. And I don’t even know where this is leading me. However, I think this attitude was reflected more in the work after Temporary Garden.
To talk more specifically about the flexibility I talked about in Temporary Garden, I was fascinated by the things I observed, things that were tangled, twisted, or penetrated and moving freely between the inside and outside of a boundary. And during the process of photographing them, I found myself climbing over the walls surrounding people’s houses to get the pictures I wanted. I was moving between the inside and the outside, too. Sometimes I would run into the homeowners. In a way, I enjoyed dealing with these awkward situations and finding a way through them. However the viewers of Temporary Garden have no way of knowing these stories hidden behind the photographs. I think that’s what photography is. There always seems to be a gap between what one wishes to express and what is actually expressed.
_Running into the homeowners must have been really awkward! (Haha.)
I was particularly fascinated by the connection between the plants in Temporary Garden crossing boundaries and you yourself moving back and forth between the inside and outside of those boundaries while taking photographs. I feel there is something in common between the two.
I also found myself nodding in agreement with your attitude of moving freely across boundaries and your willingness to embrace both sides of two opposing values.
And I was equally intrigued by what you said about the stories hidden behind the photographs. You mentioned that there is always a gap between what one wishes to express and what is actually expressed.
How do you feel about this very nature of photography — the fact that there are always experiences that remain unseen and things that cannot be fully conveyed through an image? Do you also find something appealing in this aspect of photography?
The limitations are clear in photography. Images are fragmentary, having no sound, difficult to grasp the context. Perhaps that’s why photography is often considered an ambiguous medium. Strangely, photography feels like a very intuitive medium to me. It’s as if photographs are saying something quite clearly. But I still don’t really know why I’m drawn to photography. Not knowing could be what drives me to keep working because when you love something and become absorbed in it, you usually don’t ask why.
_Your words about photographs seeming to speak for themselves reminded me of Luigi Ghirri's Lessons in Photography.
I also deeply relate to what you said about how not knowing might be what drives you to keep creating.
Perhaps it is precisely because we don't know that we want to know, to understand. And perhaps remaining in that state of not knowing allows us to look more carefully at others (our subjects) and listen more attentively to them.
When I look at your photographs, I feel that the very act of taking photographs is connected to this kind of attitude.
How do you feel about that?
To be more precise, I don't make any judgments when I'm deeply absorbed in something or focused. I feel that this is the only state in which careful observation can take place. The kind of observation I’m talking about is one that makes me to react without being force myself to take photographs. All of my projects have started in this way.
For example, the scenes in the Temporary Garden were photos shot without knowing that they might become a series. Over time, I realized that similar kinds of photos had gathered, so I deliberately searched for similar subjects. When you realize it has the potential to be a project, you start to find meaning in it. And somewhere along the way, they need to reach a negotiation to bring the project to a close. I’m not saying that looking for meaning is a bad thing. But on the other hand, I don't think I want to interpret or view the present based on past experiences or knowledge. I believe the reason I try to embrace two opposing values is because of this dilemma.
_I see. So rather than taking photographs with a clear intention from the beginning, a series gradually emerged from the photographs you had taken over time. I find that very interesting.
Throughout our conversation, I've been particularly struck by how often you've spoken about "not knowing" and "accepting." Earlier, you also mentioned that accepting nature means recognizing that there are things we can never fully understand or control.
These words give me the impression that, rather than trying to understand everything through your own ideas or judgments, you first try to be receptive to what is in front of you.
At the same time, I think that as a photographer, you are also in a position to take what you have observed and present it to others through your own expression.
With that in mind, is there anything you consciously pay attention to when taking photographs, selecting images, and bringing them together as a work?
And how do you see the relationship between being receptive to something and actively expressing it?
I think that has gradually changed over time, from when I first started taking photographs to where I am now. I don’t think there’s one absolute standard that guides me when I take or select photographs. For example, I mentioned that even when people look at the photographs in Temporary Garden, they can’t know what I actually experienced while taking them on the street. That sense of limitation became the starting point for the series of Smoking Area. I deliberately planned the work in a way that would encourage viewers, as they looked at the photographs, to imagine what the photographer might have experienced when taking the photos. In a way, I approached the work as a kind of performance work in which the artist doesn’t appears in the frame. But I don’t want to keep repeating this approach. Rather than staying in one place, I want to keep moving forward, and I hope that this desire will be reflected in my works.
_I can certainly see Smoking Area as a performance work. When I looked through the book, I felt as though I was experiencing the scenes through your eyes as the photographer, almost as if my own gaze were overlapping with yours. I found myself imagining what you might have experienced, how the people you photographed might have looked at you, and what they might have said to you.
You mentioned that you want to keep moving forward rather than staying in one place. Looking back at the progression from Temporary Garden to Smoking Area, and then to Big Dream, what kinds of changes do you feel have taken place in your work or in yourself?
Also, when I looked at Big Dream, I had the impression that it was somehow more personal, perhaps closer to your own feelings and inner world than your previous works. How do you see it yourself?
I feel like there was a definite shift after Smoking Area. Earlier, we talked about the limitations of fragmented images. I think what I had been doing, up to that point was gathering those fragmented images and giving them context through the editing process. But you can’t really find that kind of context in Big Dream. At first glance, the images in the book don’t seem to have anything to do with one another. In a way, I think I wanted to try accepting the nature and limitations of photography as they are, much like acknowledging and accepting my own imperfections as a person. I think that my own inner world was reflected in Big Dream.
_Indeed, as I turn the pages of Big Dream, each photograph feels like an independent work in its own right.
At the same time, however, these photographs are bound together into a single photobook and given one title. As you've mentioned throughout our conversation, I imagine that bringing them together as a book also involved various decisions about its design.
Was there a particular intention behind designing these photographs into one unified form?
Or could it be that the book took shape through the very things you've spoken about so far — your inner world, the contradictions that may exist within it, and your attitude of accepting them?
The photos in Big Dream were taken between 2016 and 2025. When I took them, I didn’t think they would become a book. Some of them were even included in other projects in the past. As I mentioned earlier, I went through a definite shift after Smoking Area. More specifically, I started to question the way I had been bringing together similar types of photographs to form of a series. I think I began to question this recurring format in which you put together a fixed number of photographs to develop a particular discourse, present the work, and then, once the project is complete, move on to the next series.
So I wanted to find a more flexible way of creating new relationships between images, including photographs I had taken in the past with specific intentions in mind. I think you can look at Big Dream as a book that brings together these attempts.
_That’s very interesting. You mentioned wanting to find “a more flexible way of creating new relationships between images.” What did you consciously consider when designing Big Dream to explore this approach?
It’s quite simple. The image that runs from the front cover, across the spine, and the back cover is actually a close-up photograph of a crumpled mirror. A mirror usually reflects your own image, but a crumpled mirror breaks reality into many pieces. And when you open the book, you see fragmented images of the world. That's it!
_What a wonderful idea and design! Now that I’ve heard the thinking behind the cover design, I find the book even more fascinating.
Thank you so much. Throughout this interview, I’ve had the opportunity to ask you about so many things — your work, your thoughts, your inspirations, photography, design, and much more.
I’d like to ask you just one final question.
Is there anything you’re particularly interested in at the moment, or anything you’d like to explore or work on in the future? I’d love to hear about it.
I don't have specific plans to take action right now. I am just waiting for something to make me react. I plan to clean my studio tomorrow, though!
Thank you so much!
Sunik Kim
Sunik Kim is a Seoul-based photographer who observes the world through a balance between recording and expression, control and instinct. Rather than focusing on what images represent, his work emerges from a particular way of engaging with life, which unfolds as his visual practice. He mainly seeks to visualize the points where phenomena within social structures intersect with personal experience through photography, and continues his practice by rearranging these through publishing and exhibitions.
