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Artwork

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What is artwork? It is not only the piece you see on the wall. It is also the work that led to it.  

For me, artwork is the process and the result in the same breath.

Growing up in my mom’s studio meant sitting among finished and unfinished paintings, watching her paint on one canvas at a time. When I was little, my mom painted with oil, which meant that she had to wait a long time for the paint to dry before she could continue adding layers. When I was in high school, she changed to acrylic, which dries much faster. With this new medium, the tempo of her work changed. She could play more with time. 

As she worked, the stacks of paintings overflowed from the studio into a storage room in the renovated basement. From there, they flowed into a repurposed closet upstairs. Today, my parents have even converted one of their bathrooms into art storage, with paintings stacked on shelves above a bathtub.

Some of those paintings remain there, unfinished, for years. Others are finalized and signed within weeks or months. The work of starting a painting, getting stuck, looking at it again from a fresh perspective, letting it be, and suddenly being pulled back in until one day it is ready to be shared… this is all part of the work of art. From there, it takes on its next purpose as it becomes a part of someone else’s life, cherished in someone else’s home, imbued with new meaning.

My grandfather was also an artist. One of the things he always told my mom was to paint every day. “Don’t paint for a show, 정희, paint because painting is your work,” he would say. 

My mom truly took his words to heart. In one way or another, even after turning seventy, my mom paints almost every single day. For her, it’s the work she does and the work she needs to do, even if she cannot foresee the final outcome as she does it.

A delightful consequence of this approach is that my mom is seemingly always ready when an exhibition presents itself. When a gallery has a sudden opening due to a change of plans, my mom is able to step in. When a new slot opens, she is ready to apply. The opportunity of an exhibition becomes a catalyst that brings certain paintings to their full expression, rather than the goal of an exhibition initiating the painting process.

If leadership may be considered an art, what, then, is the work of leadership? It is not reaching the top box in an org chart or framing a certification. It is the everyday act of readying, inspirited by a deep knowing that a more beautiful world awaits – a world that includes us all.

An idea that sits at the core of how I approach my work is the idea of leadership as a choice – a choice that can present itself to anyone at any moment. Rather than it being a person, a title, or the “ownership” of a team or mandate, leadership begins in those moments when your heart races, when you know something greater is possible, even if the thought of it feels scary. It’s when you choose personal purposeful risk in service of that greater hope – even if it means disappointing those benefiting from the status quo. 

The work of noticing leadership moments when they present themselves and choosing to step into them is daily work. And this act of readying reframes what ‘opportunities’ look like and when they appear. 

It is no longer about harnessing control or certainty. It is about unfolding purpose in action.

As I have prepared to start sharing my reflections, I have wondered if this is how my mom feels before a gallery opening. For me, the act of sharing has become the next part of my own readying, not the goal that got me here.

Over the coming months you will catch glimpses of the (un)finished paintings stacked in different corners of my life.

And, as is always the case with leadership as I understand it, I did not journey here alone.