Who are creating art? Most of students are always consumers in art field. Yet here are student producers who create art. The Sookmyung Times (SMT) met the Chief of Sulmi, Lee Soyoung (LEE)
Sulmi is the only amateur art club in SMU and they started from 1975. Sulmi (雪美) means esthetic desire designed on white canvas. ”We can color the background on a newspaper and then draw over it. We can also use ink as a drawing method or even paint on top of a stone. A member of our group even made a clock over a canvas that was already drawn by putting an acryl over it.” Sulme don’t set any restrictions in choosing the materials or elements that are needed for the paintings. However, they generally draw paintings rather than focusing on conceptual or installation art. “This is because they readily enable us to express our thoughts, not to mention their convenience for storage. It’s also easy to correct the mistakes on the drawings because oil paintings usually don’t dry that fast.” Lee said.
Activity in Sulmi
They are going to hold an exhibition session in May and October. Because the new-coming members don t have much time (because of the two month time range from March to May), they turn in paintings that’s not even dry. In contrast, the members that were in the group for some time are not that busy due to the fact that they have been working on their paintings since the winter break. “Regardless of the time range, all the members in our group feel pleased and satisfied when they see their paintings get hung on the walls at the exhibitions." Lee said. The spring exhibition session is occasionally held at the same time with our school s annual festival. Sulmi opens a kind of a feast on the last day of our school festival, and the friends of the members in Sulmi enjoy time looking at the paintings. The fall exhibition session holds a lot of paintings since they can spend more time on the drawings during the summer vacation. Sulmi also gather up with each other after the freshman greetings ceremony, the lecture beginning and ending conference every semester. They also go on a membership training session two times each year during the summer and winter break. The members even go to the art museums together to take a look at the paintings that are displayed. Last year they went to the Fernando Botero exhibition which was held at Duksugoong in the summer, and the Picasso, Monet exhibition in the winter.
Education Programs in Sulmi Usually the newcomers in Sulme are students who have never drawn such paintings. A professor from SMU instructs us about two hours every week. “We call this session an A.T., which stands for Art Training, which teaches us the basic concepts about the oil paintings." Through A.T., they educated by lectures such as the kinds of tools that are used and how they should be treated, the methods used in working on the details of the canvas before actually drawing a painting. “The members of our group usually bring the images to our professor. She then goes over it and explains to us the kinds of effects that will be good for the painting." Lee said. If a student has no knowledge about art and painting, that’s not problem to be member of Sulmi. 
Attraction of Sulmi
There is Sulwoohoi, a group for alumnae who acted in Sulmi. “Before we have exhibition, we invite Sulwoohoi, many seniors have work and business, and they visit our exhibition. There are also artist who was in Sulmi, even she was not majoring in Art or painting. Kim Saehae, graduated from in Chinese Language and Literature, is she. The experience in Sulmi became inspiration and motivation for her to turn her way. In addition, there are also many students majoring in Art come to Sulmi. They already work in Art. What is the real attraction of Sulmi” Won’t that be freedom then? Our group members can draw and use any materials we want to, so students who are exhausted relieve the stress that they have received during the day at Sulmi."
ALL PHOTOS FROM LEE
