Philosophical undertones have long belayed the work of Kwang Jean Park, and her sloughing off of the nearly inexhaustible but roundly approachable concept of Yin and Yang—with all of the strictures, balances and too-easy Eastern cultural connotations carried therein—in her more recent practice allows for a more nebulous, expansive philosophy of nature to enter her work.

Contemporary artist Kwang Jean Park's work is currently on display in the Fermilab Art Gallery on the second floor of Wilson Hall. An artist reception will take place today, from 5 to 7 p.m. A unique harmony of science and art resonates through the abstract work of contemporary artist Kwang Jean Park. Using woodcut and had drawings on paper or mixed media on canvas, Park conveys the beauty and the unknown in what she calls the "true substance of nature." Park's exhibit will be on display in the Fermilab Art Gallery through Oct. 29.

South Korean artist Kwang Jean Park's second solo exhibition in the United States -- like the first, in 2002, at the Andrew Bae Gallery -- is of paintings, collages and woodblock prints that soften and vary geometric motifs but are most concerned with something beyond the formal arrangements. For a decade, the artist has been engaged in giving visual form to the Taoist concept of yin and yang, and several of these pieces bearing lavish textures are on view.

Kwang Jean Park's work looks deceptively simple. At first glance, one sees familiar geometric shapes such as circles, squares and waveforms, the rigidity of which she has softened. But closer inspection reveals layers of technical, visual and conceptual complexity as shapes and colors overlap. She has adapted and combined various printing, drawing, painting and collage techniques to create her distinct pieces. Park uses multiple layers of woodblock printing and then returns to the print with brushes, pigments and pencil to deepen and further enrich the image. Because of this meticulous layering and the use of oil-based inks, her prints have a unique tactile quality.

Kwang Jean Park's exhibition of paintings and large woodblock prints at the Andrew Bae Gallery presents a particular problem to Western viewers who are likely to see the works in formal terms. They are accomplished variations of such geometric motifs as circles, triangles and squares, sometimes appearing as landscapes, sometimes abstractions. But neither the motifs nor their treatments in prints or paintings is really the focus of the work. That resides in a spiritual content based on the Taoist concept of yin and yang. Park has been engaged with this concept of about a decade, finding in inexhaustible, as indeed it is to anyone who accepts it as a principle extra-artistic in nature.

Two artists's explorations of form led Acting Curator of Asian Art Mary Dusenbury to pair them in the next exhibition at the Spencer Museum of Art. Form, Line and Light: The Work of Shinoda Toko and Park Kwang Jean opens in the White Gallery December 1. Japanese artist Shnoda, now 88, has had a long, illustrious career while Korean-born Park is gaining recongnition at mid-point in her work.

Park Kwang Jean was born in 1957. She graduated from the College Fine Arts of Ewha Women's University in 1979, received an M.F.A. from the same university in 1981, and completed post-graduate work at Tama Art University in Tokyo, Japan. She has taught at Sukmyung University, Ewha Women's University and Hansung University in Seoul.