For this project, Artspace Director Raechell Smith approached Yoonmi Nam with the invitation to consider a work for the billboard site and introduced the artist to Kansas City-based educator and writer Dr. Eleanor Lim-Midyett to initiate a conversation about the inspirations to be found in Yoonmi Nam’s work. 

Their overlapping interests in contemporary popular culture, understanding the influence of traditional cultural practices like ikebana floral arrangement, and the consideration of the Asian American experience are explored in an essay commissioned for the occasion and published on the Artspace website. 

Yoonmi Nam is known for her exquisite and precisely detailed lithographic prints which celebrate ancient traditions and contemporary techniques that blend eastern and western knowledge and practices. In an ongoing exploration of the still-life tradition, her elevated observations of everyday objects offer a poetic meditation on beauty and impermanence in works such as Blizz.   

Yoonmi states, “I am attracted to the beauty, irony, and artistry of flower arrangements. The flowers, once cut from their roots, have only a short remaining time to live and then will quickly wither and die. But before they do, they are elegantly and elaborately arranged, as if time will stand still for them.”

According to Lim-Midyett, “this ephemerality is particularly evident through the peony flowers featured in Blizz, given the floral species’ acute sensitivity to the vicissitudes of spring rain and winds. Similarly, the Dairy Queen Blizzard container holding the blooms also has a fleeting purpose and is ultimately thrown away after a single use. While the repurposing of the container as a make-shift vase signals the theme of sustainability, the juxtaposition of the disposable container with the carefully arranged flowers creates a visual dialogue that reflects an attempt to create and preserve beauty in the context of an ever-changing reality, thus evoking the themes of impermanence and persistence.”