The Reborn Genius of an Arts High School - Chapter 147

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This chapter was translated by Lunox Novels. To support us and help keep this series going, visit our website: LunoxScans.com
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Episode 147.
Ye Ji realized she’d answered without thinking and clamped her mouth shut.
“Oh, who was that just now?”
The Lecture Hall was quiet, so the Professor asked after hearing Ye Ji’s response.
At the sound of his voice, Ye Ji deliberately pulled her cap down and lowered her head as if she were nobody.
A few students glanced around following the Professor’s tone.
They seemed to notice Ye Ji’s unfamiliar face, but none paid it much attention.
Nineteen or twenty looked much the same anyway.
It didn’t occur to them that she might be anyone other than a student.
But the Professor, who had learned in advance that Ye Ji would be auditing today, appeared to catch on that she was the one who’d answered, and continued the lecture naturally.
“Anyway, back to the point.”
The lecture proceeded with theoretical arguments and critiques from the art world, followed by discussions of the diverse artworks that emerged from them.
Some familiar territory mixed with unfamiliar works.
The Professor’s delivery was dry, but the class itself was certainly substantive.
As she listened, Ye Ji’s mind drifted.
Perhaps talent and communication were fundamentally opposed qualities.
If one became absorbed in one’s inner world and neglected the outside, one inevitably became trapped in one’s own universe.
She thought she’d learned how to communicate well in this life, but in this field, didn’t she still have far to go?
Her work remained confined to private objects.
Just Canvas.
She conveyed her emotions to viewers through the rectangular frame.
It was hard to call that genuine Communication.
It was closer to one-way transmission.
Simply knowing something in your head wasn’t enough.
Her work still had a long road ahead, and she couldn’t enlighten herself alone on everything.
It didn’t have to be entirely new knowledge.
Someone else already knew it, but had forgotten.
She needed to be reminded and made to reconsider those things she’d turned away from.
“You all know Andy Warhol’s work, right?”
Warhol’s name and works were famous enough that even those unfamiliar with art knew them.
He simply painted mass-produced objects like Campbell’s soup cans and showed them to audiences.
But that wasn’t all.
Mass-produced items that were merely brought in and assigned meaning began to be called ‘art.’
“Arthur Danto referred to this trend as the End of Art.”
It was a provocative term, but one that captured a widely recognized phenomenon.
Under the pretext of breaking the existing framework of art, works that now prompted the question ‘This is art?’ had begun to flourish.
“For thousands of years, visual art has undergone a history of Visual Development that delighted the eye.”
The renewed attention to Ye Ji’s work stemmed from the same logic.
Her works possessed color and communicative power suited to contemporary sensibility, but the very method of painting itself was pure Analog.
Densely filled, they were a powerful stimulus that drew admiration and appreciation from viewers.
But the reason artists like Ye Ji hadn’t emerged recently was intuitive.
“The visual inquiry of art has already ended. Nearly every conceivable possibility has already been explored.”
It worked only because Ye Ji possessed talent.
Who in this day and age could paint something better than the celebrated painters of the past?
Art, weighed down by insurmountable mountains, had begun to devolve into endless cycles of imitation.
That was the End of Art.
Yet humans continued to seek new meaning in art.
“What makes art art? Now it’s no longer confined to visible form or technique alone.”
While listening to the subsequent lecture, Ye Ji scribbled with her pen.
The class was rather pedantic, but she found it engaging enough.
What further contemplation would she need to create better work going forward?
She hadn’t found the answer, but she felt she’d found her direction.
If she, who drew attention by grasping the very end of art at its terminus, could—
Might she be able to bring forth the rebirth of a new art?
‘…There’s still far to go.’
Alongside the thought of its impossibility came the thought that nothing was beyond her grasp.
As Ye Ji listened to the lecture amid these musings, the tip of her ballpoint pen moved unconsciously.
Across a page she’d filled entirely, students of various kinds were rendered in one continuous black line.
Ye Ji felt somewhat apologetic that she’d spent half the lecture lost in thought.
Yet in her own way, she’d gained something from the class.
“Well, that’s all for today.”
Everyone, don’t forget your assignment deadlines!
As the Professor ended the class, he shifted his gaze and met Ye Ji’s eyes.
After a light nod of acknowledgment between them,
Ye Ji quietly slipped out of the Lecture Hall, mixing in with the students hurrying away.
She felt a bit bad about not properly greeting him, but this was how they’d agreed to do it.
Korean University classes weren’t worth a pittance, after all.
The Department Head had specifically asked her to keep it discreet from the other students.
“…….”
Among the departing students,
the Professor watched Ye Ji naturally blend into the crowd and momentarily halted at the spot she’d vacated.
A torn page from her Notebook lay on the ground, apparently dropped as she hastily gathered her things.
Inside, the scene of the Lecture Hall was drawn in black ballpoint pen as if sketched.
Monochromatic, with lines of uniform thickness strung together in one continuous Sketch.
Yet how she had observed the lecture came through utterly unfiltered.
“Hmm….”
With a brief murmur of appreciation, he too picked up the scrap of paper and left the Lecture Hall.
The late autumn sunlight stretched long across the now-silent Lecture Hall.
***
Students who had to attend their next lecture were all moving urgently.
It was clearly different from high school’s inter-building classes.
Ye Ji stopped momentarily, lost in thought, watching students cross the sprawling campus.
Even her art high school had an unconventional class structure.
She’d expected university wouldn’t be all that different.
“It’s quite different though….”
The atmosphere, one might say.
Nothing about it felt remotely the same.
“Who are you?”
Just then, a hand suddenly grabbed Ye Ji’s shoulder, startling her.
She nearly dropped her Notebook as she turned around.
To her surprise, a familiar face appeared.
“What are you doing here right now?”
It was Kang Yura.
Since they weren’t close enough to stay in regular contact, it had been a long time since she’d seen her.
Now in university, Kang Yura seemed much the same as before.
The main difference was that she looked a bit more mature in casual clothes.
Since neither was the type to make a fuss, they greeted each other quietly.
And Ye Ji thought they’d part ways then….
“Busy?”
“Well, not really….”
Unable to flatly refuse, the two found themselves sitting across from each other at a small Cafe tucked away in a corner of campus.
Kang Yura, who had seemed to have something to say, spent the entire time looking at her Mobile Phone.
The issue was… that Mobile Phone was a limited Goyo edition by Hansung….
“…Someone’s supposed to come.”
Kang Yura seemed to think Ye Ji was staring because she was sitting alone with a guest and only looking at her phone.
Had she still not realized that Goyo and herself were the same person?
More pressingly—someone was coming?
“I saw you coming out of the Lecture Hall earlier. What happened?”
Before Ye Ji could ask anything, Kang Yura’s question came first.
So Ye Ji had no choice but to explain the situation methodically.
“…Is that so?”
The Department Head’s sudden proposal and the sequence of events.
But Kang Yura merely raised an eyebrow as though she’d expected it all.
It wasn’t a particularly surprised reaction.
“You don’t seem very surprised.”
Ye Ji, who had taken a sip of the sweetly rich chocolate drink, creased her brow slightly.
It must be the kind of sugar-laden drink that students in a slump chug like a transfusion.
Kang Yura, observing her, spoke in her characteristic cold, monotone manner.
“I told the Department Head about you. I thought if he was interested, he’d reach out.”
If things happened this way, all the better.
At Kang Yura’s words, Ye Ji was the surprised one this time.
So in other words.
“You’re the one who started all this?”
Before Kang Yura could answer Ye Ji’s question,
a hurried set of footsteps suddenly reached Ye Ji’s ears.
As she glanced toward the approaching sound, another familiar face came into view.
“Ye Ji!”
This time it was Hyun A.
Now that she thought about it, she did recall hearing that Hyun A had enrolled at this university.
She’d been delighted, saying she’d attended a good school with much improved practical skills and college entrance exam scores.
“How long has it been? How have you been?”
Hyun A, who chattered on about learning from Kang Yura’s contact, had changed quite a bit in image from her high school days.
Back then she’d had a rather passive air about her.
“Seeing you here makes me so happy!”
With her brightly dyed hair and animated tone, she seemed considerably changed.
Suddenly, the summer of last year came to mind.
The image of her looking despondent, as if everything had fallen apart when she gave up the Special Program.
People were always changing, little by little.
For the sake of Hyun A, who had changed for the better, Ye Ji had to repeat the explanation she’d given Kang Yura once more.
“You should really come to our school. You’d find it genuinely fun.”
Ye Ji agreed with Hyun A’s brightened comment.
The Special Program classes they’d shared were enjoyable even compared to now.
With these long-missed, welcome faces, Ye Ji completed her university visit.
***
With each passing day, the daylight grew shorter and the coolness of the wind stronger than the warmth of the sun.
The college entrance exam drew near.
Most of the Artworks Ye Ji had continued creating were now complete.
Pieces combining what she did well with new challenges.
The number of completed works had already surpassed seventy,
and dozens of carefully selected Artworks for promotional materials and marketing crossed the ocean ahead, bound for New York.
Sending Artworks carefully wrapped in all manner of packing materials across borders was neither simple financially nor administratively.
Hyun Min was also busy at this time, so Ye Ji had to rely on Han Gyu’s help as well.
There were challenges along the way, but the New York side was very satisfied with the Artworks they received.
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Dear Artist, hello. This is Emma Lee from Blank New York.
I have safely received the portion of your Artworks sent for advance marketing photography today.
After encountering the actual Artworks, in order to proceed with an exhibition befitting them,
our entire planning team is doing our utmost to provide you with a perfect environment.
…(abridged)…
I thank you again for the finest work, and I look forward to the remaining pieces.
I will be in touch again soon.
-Emma Lee, Director of Blank New York
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[Emma: This is amazing, what an amazing work?]
[Emma: Better than I expected~~!]
The email and message arrived almost simultaneously.
Though sent by the same person, the tone was completely different.
How could adults maintain such a temperature difference between personal and professional communication?
Is this business?
With this fresh realization, Ye Ji could finally breathe easier.
Fortunately, the side that had expanded the scope was pleased, so now it was truly just finishing touches.
“…….”
Once the major hurdle was cleared, Ye Ji made a decision.
Looking back now, perhaps the answer had always been decided from the moment she began deliberating.
They say when you can’t decide, you just do it.
After organizing the formal application and documents and sending an official email to admissions,
[I’ll do it. Special Admission]
Ye Ji sent a text to the Department Head.

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This chapter was translated by Lunox Novels. To support us and help keep this series going, visit our website: LunoxScans.com
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