“Stains” are peculiar traces existing between the object and the gaze. Within symbolic order, a stain is quickly dismissed as mere dirt or unnecessary detail that must be eradicated, yet often it provokes us to contemplate momentarily about the invisible realities and hidden truths of life. —Seo Hee-won, "Hands Covering Stains"

Ahn Sang-hoon’s paintings reveal and erase repeatedly. Starting with images doomed to disappear from photographs, they undergo numerous painterly decisions and transform into abstract canvases, their traces solidifying on the surface. In this process, the concepts of "hands" and "stains" operate as underlying elements in his work. Hands leave their mark through every stage, while stains accept these marks, existing in their imperfect state. Stains often reveal truths just before they vanish, momentarily residing in tranquility within the canvas. They navigate between disappearance and persistence, continuously transforming and being reborn. The work begins in these moments of disappearance. Photos discarded in the iPhone's trash bin, destined to be blurrily erased like fragments of memory, are summoned onto the canvas through techniques like watercolor, acrylic, and spray paint to form the initial layer. However, this is just the beginning. Figuratively formed images are again transformed and destroyed through thick layers of paint and finger painting, a process not of mere deconstruction but of finding the seeds of new order amidst chaos. Recent works like "The Plant That Couldn’t Survive Winter," "Green Santa," and "Morning Exercises" imagine various layers as a single stratum, combining them flatly with just oil paint.

The artist's method is closely linked to his approach to painting, appearing as a resistance to traditional meanings of painting. He does not see painting merely as a tool for representation, so in his works, traces of reference or appropriation are either removed or left dysfunctional. Even the titles of the works sever their relationship with the images, leaving linguistic traces within the canvas uninterpreted. This attitude explores another possibility of painting. Unlike the common trend in contemporary painting to assign meaning, he seeks to reveal the intrinsic potential of painting itself by removing representation and networks of meaning. He constantly changes, exploring new possibilities of painting amidst disorder and sometimes wavering in the face of encountered uncertainties. For him, uncertainty is not a threat but an opportunity for new possibilities and experimentation, repeating the potential for failure within an unfinished and unstable state, constantly questioning his own paintings.