KIMKUN: UNMASKED

In the digital age, we wear countless faces. The KIMKUN MASK series visualizes the sensation of anonymity hidden among those faces. These masks are more than just forms.
Geometrically restrained planes and lines intersect with the raw materiality of each object, creating faces that serve as metaphors for the ‘masks’ we wear online.
They can be anyone—or no one at all. This series extends from the broader KIMKUN project. While the earlier works revealed the physicality of presence through the silhouette of a figure, the masks, by contrast, conceal that presence. There are no emotions, no names behind these faces.
Yet, within that blankness, viewers are invited to imagine a multitude of expressions.

Contemporary society is filled with phenomena that blur the boundaries of identity: deepfake technology, fake news, avatars, and the culture of filters on social media. KIMKUN MASK offers a quiet inquiry into these shifts. Who are we, and which face do we present to the world? These masks speak a part of that question on our behalf.

PERSONA (01~09)

Among the many masks in the KIMKUN MASK series, I selected nine forms and assigned each a distinct persona. These are not merely variations in design, but symbolic masks reflecting inner emotions and psychological states. Each persona is connected to a specific color, texture, and material atmosphere, metaphorically expressing a range of mental states such as fear, nihilism, solitude, idealism, silence, and anger. Through this, the mask transcends its form, expanding into an independent artwork that reveals fragments of the human psyche. For me, these nine masks represent a visual inquiry into the question, "To what extent is the face we wear truly our own?". They are also a record visualizing the psychological anonymity of people living in contemporary society.

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Each persona was not realized as a simple symbol, but as a concrete form. The design aimed to embed psychological landscapes within geometric segmentation and abstract structures, undergoing a meticulous sculptural process from digital modeling to hand-finishing. The initial designs were developed using 3D modeling, repeatedly translating the emotional structures of various personas into geometric planes and angles.

Through prototyping with a 3D printer, the life-size structures were tested, revised, and refined. The final forms were produced in poli, and the post-processing involved careful sanding and painting to ensure that the emotional rhythm between each surface connected seamlessly. This production method was an attempt to achieve both the precision of digital sculpture and the depth of handcrafted materiality.

MASK: PERSONA

Nine distinct personas, each with a unique emotional structure, were realized through geometric abstraction and precise digital sculpting. Digital modeling and 3D printing were used to examine the structural coherence of the designs, while hand-finishing allowed for the emotional rhythm between surfaces to be finely tuned. The final works juxtapose diverse psychological faces within a unified format, exploring layered personas at the boundary between anonymity and identity.