Unnamed Road

To distill a feeling
You must still your feelings.
But the mind is its own mirage,
The desert a looking-glass.

“Making pictures in Israel and Palestine was above all an emotional challenge. My photographs usually deal with something eternal in the landscape, but in this place the layers of history and conflict, fear and hostility, frustrated my camera. I happened to travel a lot in the West Bank, not for any political purpose, but because I liked the landscape between the cities. I tried to gaze at the land, without prejudice or judgment. I didn’t want to deal with the masks of the people and I didn’t want to put on my own mask. I wanted to see it as the olive tree sees it. But I felt overwhelmed by the realities around me. I felt sad and uncomfortable much of the time, and I found myself trying to make photographs in a place I didn’t want to be. It was difficult, but looking back, I can see that it forced me to change as an artist and I am grateful for that. On my final trip, I was able to see, not only the land, but my own mind, with its uneven terrain and movements, and to touch something elemental.” ― Jungjin Lee

This new, expanded edition of Unnamed Road was designed by Jungjin Lee, and published on the occasion of an exhibition at GoEun Museum of Photography in Busan, South Korea

---

Born in Korea in 1961, Lee began photographing while a student at Hongik University in Seoul, where she earned a BFA in ceramics in 1984. After graduating, Lee worked as a photo journalist and freelance photographer. She earned an MA in Photography from New York University in 1991. While in New York City, Lee worked for the photographer Robert Frank. Later, she traveled across the country and was deeply moved by the American desert, which became the subject of several of her photographic series. 

Lee’s work has been exhibited widely and is in countless collections, including the The Metropolitan Museum of Art, Whitney Museum of American Art, LA County Museum of Art, Houston Museum of Fine Arts, the National Museum of Modern and Contemporary Art in Gwacheon, Korea, the Seoul Museum of Art, and the Goeun Museum of Photography in Busan, Korea.