Ham Jin (b. 1978) has been creating intricate miniature sculptures using discarded small objects such as insects, pills, and fingernails, as well as synthetic clay. The artist incorporates everyday items—often overlooked and rarely used as artistic materials—into his work, translating his experiences of the world into playful and spontaneous sculptural pieces. 

Through this process, Ham Jin adds unique narratives and imaginative elements, presenting crowds of miniature figures and the microcosms they inhabit, all crafted with his distinctive miniature sculpting techniques.

Ham Jin’s sculptures, crafted from various objects, are as small as a fingernail. Despite their minute size, his miniature works are packed with intricate details and the artist’s ingenious imagination, forming self-contained, tiny worlds. 

The origins of Ham Jin’s miniature sculptural universe trace back to his childhood, when he played with clay. Often left alone due to his parents’ busy work schedules, he spent much of his time shaping tiny figures with his hands, laying the foundation for his unique artistic expression.

Ham Jin began to gain recognition in 1999 when, as a senior at university, he won a competition organized by Project Space Sarubia. His solo exhibition “Imaginative Diary” from that time showcased a miniature kingdom of handmade clay figures, reflecting both the “pleasure” and “obsession” of a child shaping Play-Doh.

The artist presented various series, including clay figures combining body parts, an insect series using materials like anchovies and silkworm pupae, and a toy series created by breaking and reconstructing small toy fragments. These miniature works were installed within gaps and structures throughout the exhibition space, inviting visitors to engage in another form of “play” by seeking out the hidden figures scattered across the venue.

In this way, Ham Jin brings his own microcosm into the real world by installing his miniature sculptures—crafted from materials like preserved insects, food waste, fingernails, and dead skin—as part of the physical space. Starting in 2004, the artist began using photography to present these miniature worlds in a more dramatic and staged manner. 

His Aewan (愛玩) series, first introduced in a solo exhibition at PKM Gallery in 2004, starkly portrays the increasingly claustrophobic and paranoid existence of humans in contemporary society. Through compositions such as miniature human figures hidden within a navel, Ham Jin metaphorically expresses the isolation of individuals, likening it to a pet unknowingly caged within ourselves.

Meanwhile, Aewan (愛玩) #3 (2004) depicts a small boy embracing a fly as large as himself on the flower. In this way, the Aewan (愛玩) series goes beyond Ham Jin's grotesque satire, employing the paradoxical concept of the word "Aewan (愛玩)," which implies "to love and play." The series captures the image of modern individuals "loving and playing" in solitude, reflecting the contradictions of contemporary existence.

The following year, in 2005, Ham Jin was invited to exhibit at the Korean Pavilion of the Venice Biennale, where he presented a new iteration of his Aewan (愛玩) series. For this occasion, the artist installed tiny sculptures on the edge of the pavilion's balcony, which could only be observed through magnifying glasses. 

Within the highly symbolic space of the Korean Pavilion, Ham Jin depicted miniature figures building leaf houses and going about their lives, adding an element of surprise and whimsy to the otherwise formal environment.

The artist’s inventive and unfiltered imagination, condensed into his miniature worlds, stems from a profound insight into the relationships among objects and their surrounding environments. While the Aewan (愛玩) series reflects his observations of individuals navigating contemporary life, the 2008 work City on a Bombshell explores the fragile existence of human figures living atop unstable urban landscapes. 

As the title suggests, City on a Bombshell is an installation created using an unexploded bomb retrieved from the U.S. Air Force bombing range in Maehyang-ri, transformed into a miniature city populated by fragile human figures. The installation features moss-like microstructures, clay-modeled concrete buildings, and pickets bearing names of capitalist icons like "Lotteria," "Nike," and "Adidas," all tangled together. This tiny city, constructed on an actual missile, encapsulates the latent anxiety of modern society, revealing the precarious foundation beneath the facade of vibrant capitalism.

If Ham Jin’s earlier works used small figurative sculptures to satirize contemporary human existence, his Untitled series, introduced in 2011, reflects his observations of the world through semi-abstract sculptures made entirely from black clay. 

The small, ambiguous black forms in the Untitled series are installed in a way that seems to let them drift freely through the exhibition space, creating an illusion of abstract black drawings translated into three-dimensional forms floating in space.

However, upon closer inspection, these works reveal vivid details—unidentifiable lifeforms emerging from human faces, rows of buildings lined up side by side, and other impressions drawn from the artist’s personal experiences and thoughts about his surroundings.

Ham Jin explains that he uses only black clay to minimize the figurative distinctions revealed by the inherent color of objects, allowing the focus to be placed on the forms themselves. As shapes of the same color become entangled to create an abstract landscape, intricate forms only emerge upon closer inspection. This work evokes a sensation in the viewer akin to reading a poem where multiple expressions are condensed into a singular experience.

Since the Untitled series, Ham Jin has shifted his focus from merely reproducing specific forms to constructing the forms themselves, and this shift has continued to inform his work. In his recent pieces, colors and shapes created through the artist’s spontaneous and intuitive choices are evident. 

Unlike the Untitled series, which was made exclusively with black clay, his recent works feature a mix of various colors. However, the use of color in these pieces is not meant to replicate particular objects, but rather stems from the artist's sensorial choices made during the process of combining the clay, resulting in a more accidental and intuitive approach to color and form.

In his recent works, unlike his earlier pieces, there is no specific story or message. Instead, he emphasizes the act of creation itself, based on the tactile sensation of feeling the material’s properties through his fingertips. The resulting forms in his works can be interpreted as certain images, but these are secondary outcomes of the creative process. These images are not original motifs of his creation.

His deformed and hybrid sculptures, which refuse to be read in a uniform direction, exist with multiple layers, including reality, interwoven within them. The re-recognition of the world and sensory experiences that arise from within the artist are condensed into these works, which are filled with vitality.

"I thought about why I enjoy making art, and I realized it's because of randomness. You don’t know what it will turn into. Whatever comes to mind at the time—sometimes I even try making something like grass or bring in the color of water if it comes to me. The process of constantly splitting and evolving, like a nervous system, is the most fun." (Ham Jin, HEREN Interview, January 2016)

Ham Jin graduated from the Department of Sculpture at Kyungwon University. Since his first solo exhibition in 1999, he has held numerous solo exhibitions at various institutions both domestically and internationally, including PKM Gallery (Seoul), Aomori Contemporary Art Centre (Aomori, Japan), Art & Public (Geneva, Switzerland), HADA Contemporary (London), DOOSAN Gallery (New York, Seoul), Chapter II (Seoul), and Perigee Gallery (Seoul).

He has also participated in significant group exhibitions at major museums and venues such as the Minsheng Art Museum in Shanghai, Union Gallery in London, Espace Culturel Louis Vuitton in Paris, Korean Cultural Center in Beijing, Rodin Gallery in Seoul, Fukuoka Asian Art Triennale, Foundation Cartier pour l’art Contemporain in Paris, Mori Art Museum in Tokyo, Art Sonje Center in Seoul, Gwangju Biennale, Busan Biennale, Seoul Museum of Art, and Busan Museum of Art. In 2005, he was selected as a participating artist for the Korean Pavilion at the 51st Venice Biennale.

References

• PKM 갤러리, 함진 (PKM Gallery, Ham Jin)
• 프로젝트 스페이스 사루비아, 공상일기 (Project Space Sarubia, Imaginative Diary)
• PKM 갤러리, 애완 (PKM Gallery, Aewan)
• 톱클래스, [이진숙이 만난 우리 시대 미술가] 조각가 함진, 2011년 8월호
• PKM 갤러리, 함진 개인전 (PKM Gallery, Ham Jin Solo Exhibition)
• 두산갤러리 뉴욕, 보이지 않는 (DOOSAN Gallery NY, Unseen) 
• 페리지갤러리, 엄마 (Perigee Gallery, Mom)
• 챕터투, 머리 (Chapter II, Head)