“Almost everything will work again if you unplug it for a few minutes…including you”
Anne Lamott

Our world as we know it has (for decades, if not longer!) glamorized productivity and is constantly praising the “hustle and work hard” mentality. We’ve all become well-versed in ‘the art of doing’ so much so that we’ve come to identify ourselves with all the different roles we take on throughout the course of our lifetime! But to what end? And at the expense of what? We’ve traded in the “being” in human being for “doing” and no one has batted an eye. And it wasn’t until the entire world was forced to hit the pause button on the hustle of bustle that become our standard way of living, that we were able to take a step back and settle back into the “being” aspect of human being. When once we had the choice to hit pause on our hustle and bustle lifestyle by going on vacation and taking a break, all of a sudden in 2020 we all found ourselves on a mandatory ‘break’ from our lifestyles! A vacation is, by definition, “an extended period of recreation (done for enjoyment when one is not working), especially one spent away from home or in traveling”. Now while the purpose of a vacation is to disconnect and recharge, the experience is pretty subjective and differs from one person to the next! For some people it could be laying on the beach all day without a care in the world while for others it could mean spending the entire day exploring and moving from one activity to the other. To each their own kinda vacation!

And on that note, Four You Gallery is pleased to introduce ‘My Kinda Vacation’, a solo exhibition taking place in Paris from November 18th until December 15th, presenting the latest work of South Korean born and New York based artist, Stickymonger. ‘My Kinda Vacation’ serves as a milestone for Stickymonger as it will be the first ever show featuring exclusively colorful pieces, as opposed to the artist’s preference towards black and white pieces; with the intention behind the artwork being to create a connection with the use of colors.
A self-proclaimed workaholic, the idea of taking a vacation sounds demanding because it’s something that’s unfamiliar to and uncharacteristic of her, which makes taking a vacation sound more like work than it does leisure. However, she has her own ‘kinda vacation’ to which she subscribes: zoning out. To Stickymonger, the only vacation she knows is zoning out, and that is her way of disconnecting and recharging. Amidst the craziness of everyday life, having moments throughout the day to reflect is her version of a vacation, making her ‘kinda vacation’ a daily routine and adaptable on the go. Each painting featured in the exhibition is a different expression of ‘her kinda vacation’ in everyday life, whether it’s daydreaming in a ball pit, on a windy day, while gazing at the night sky or watching the snow fall from the warmth of the indoors – different strokes to different folks. With life as we’ve known it being redefined in these unprecedented times, this begs the question: what does YOUR kinda vacation look like these days?