The Reborn Genius of an Arts High School - Chapter 47

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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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Chapter 47.
Another work had been completed.
Thickly layered paint, stacked with weight, creating a mysterious atmosphere through its three-dimensionality and ambiguous directionality.
A liberated piece that offered different impressions depending on the direction it was hung.
Ye-ji’s mental imagery had once again been realized on canvas.
“Hmm….”
Up to this point was familiar territory for Ye-ji.
Translating onto canvas the things that filled her mind—the ones she couldn’t suppress and had to pour out.
But everything that came after was an area still rough with inexperience.
[Director Shin: You finished it faster than expected?]
[Director Shin: Then, could you bring it to this address on Saturday?]
And with it came a single address.
It was a gallery somewhere in Yangpyeong, a fair distance away.
With that, the work left Ye-ji’s hands, passing to the shipping company and becoming the owner’s possession.
A commissioned piece of this scale was a first for Ye-ji, so a peculiar mixture of excitement and tension flooded through her at once.
‘Is this really where it ends?’
It felt different from when she exhibited and sold works.
In exhibitions, she hung her works exactly as she wished and presented them to many viewers.
After that, whether the work sold or other matters progressed—she’d considered it none of her concern and hadn’t worried much.
But this time was different.
Someone with a discerning eye might grasp Ye-ji’s intention at a glance.
But most people would likely stop at simply appreciating the work’s beauty.
The chance was high they’d be content with just that.
After all, she was creating pieces anyone could enjoy.
‘That wouldn’t be so bad either….’
But if possible, she wanted them to know this was a work whose meaning deepened the more one looked at it.
It was only natural—she’d poured so much effort into it.
After a moment of thought, Ye-ji picked up her phone for the first time in a while and called someone.
***
“Hello? You’re calling me of all people—what’s the occasion?”
Han-gyu, who answered Ye-ji’s call, offered a greeting tinged with playfulness.
Usually she’d contact Hae-yoon and mention Han-gyu in passing—she rarely called him directly.
When there was nothing to discuss, that was enough.
In that sense, Ye-ji calling him directly likely meant she had something to ask.
“It’s just… when moving the work, would it be all right if I went along?”
“Ah, you’re asking if you can come when they ship it?”
Being still a student, she wouldn’t be expected to know how such operations worked.
But at Ye-ji’s follow-up remark, Han-gyu found himself laughing slightly before answering.
“No, no—that’s fine. Of course, shipping and hanging are their jobs, but you wouldn’t be a bother if you wanted to oversee it.”
Ye-ji seemed worried her involvement might be an unpleasant request for the shipping people.
“Unless you planned to demand they charge you less instead….”
Han-gyu knew Ye-ji wasn’t that sort of person.
He added a slightly teasing question.
“So if it were a bother, were you just going to step back?”
At Han-gyu’s words, Ye-ji fell silent for a moment, then answered in a slightly smaller voice.
[No, not that. I was thinking I’d just offer more money instead. Appropriate compensation depending on the circumstances.]
She wanted to be courteous, not a pushover.
Hearing Ye-ji state her position clearly, Han-gyu laughed while reflecting on himself for a moment.
Without realizing it, had he perhaps looked down on shipping companies and people hired for simple tasks?
Such a thought crossed his mind.
No wonder adults had a reason to like her.
But anyway.
“So the piece that Director Shin commissioned is done?”
Ye-ji answered Han-gyu’s question briefly.
At her confirmation, Han-gyu quickly followed up.
“Could you maybe send me a photo of it?”
Ye-ji was an expected newcomer, but truly, still very much a newcomer.
The number of works publicly shown was extremely limited.
Because of that, curiosity about her work naturally followed.
But that curiosity couldn’t be satisfied—it had to remain unsatisfied.
“Oh, right? The director asked you not to tell anyone?”
Confidentiality?
Just what kind of project had Director Shin commissioned to impose such conditions?
The thought that he couldn’t see the work made his curiosity surge.
Whether Ye-ji knew about Han-gyu’s restless curiosity or not.
After finishing their business, she hung up with a brief goodbye.
“…What exactly did she paint?”
Really, what on earth did she paint?
The more he thought about it, the more his curiosity grew.
And among those few publicly revealed works.
The pieces Ye-ji had received high praise for at Seo-hwa-won had various experimental elements.
That creativity and unique sensibility were enough to provoke people, but it wasn’t her specialty.
The same applied to what she’d submitted to Montravelu.
But oil painting?
Wasn’t that Ye-ji’s specialty?
“….”
His curiosity had reached its peak, but nothing changed.
He couldn’t see it right now.
So Han-gyu had one method available.
“…Hae-yoon!”
Simply tell him everything.
Given Hae-yoon’s nature, he was sure to get curious and couldn’t resist.
He’d definitely go see the work, so wouldn’t Han-gyu just have to follow along?
“What! Why are you calling me?”
Hae-yoon responded to Han-gyu’s call with a lukewarm tone.
Though he acted cool around Ye-ji, his passion for art was no less than that of any twenty-something art student.
“Well, it’s like this. I got a call from Ye-ji.”
Han-gyu casually told Hae-yoon everything while pretending it was just an update on Ye-ji’s recent activities.
***
Myung-hee was busy even on weekends.
Her daily life had long been consumed by work—she’d grown accustomed to it her whole life.
That’s how she’d come to think.
The life of a chaebol family.
To complain about being busy and swamped would invite justified criticism.
“In the evening you have a dinner appointment with the director, so you’ll need to leave again within the hour.”
Maintaining connections was exhausting beyond measure.
But Myung-hee could only nod.
There were certainly ways to make things easier.
With a bit of shortcutting and the right illegal measures, everything could be simplified.
But Myung-hee didn’t want to do that.
She didn’t want to become a parent her sons would be ashamed of.
Dragging her mind—sufficiently exhausted—forward, Myung-hee moved her feet.
“….”
And then she could see it.
As though the entire hall had been drenched in a pale blue hue.
A deep sea, shimmering in rich blue, hung on the wall in a single frame.
“You came.”
Because the painting captured her gaze first, Myung-hee only belatedly noticed Ye-ji standing beside it.
“…You came yourself? You didn’t have to.”
She’d received photos of the intermediate stages, so she’d expected no great emotional impact.
But the moment she witnessed the physical work, she realized that assumption was wrong.
Moreover, what had drawn Myung-hee’s eye had an even more instinctive reason than the work’s excellence.
“You hung the piece… in an unusual way?”
The gallery in Yangpyeong.
To be precise, it wasn’t Myung-hee’s property.
It was where the countless works she’d collected as gifts for Hyun-min were stored.
Since it reflected Hyun-min’s taste rather than her own, there were many diverse and bold pieces.
But no matter how much diversity there was, most works were trapped within rectangular frames.
A wall lined with row after row of square shapes.
Yet Ye-ji’s work hung there as a diamond—its corners pointing upward.
Beyond the work’s excellence, it couldn’t help but reflexively draw the eye first.
“Yes, I thought it might be good to explain a bit.”
Listening to Ye-ji’s words, Myung-hee stepped closer to the painting.
From the sea foam, droplets seemed to have just burst forth, the three-dimensionality vivid and fragmentary.
Rough wave textures crossed each other, creating white foam.
Thickly layered paint created harsh shadows, forming strong contrast.
As she contemplated the dynamic work, she could see something opposite beneath it—locked serenity.
A pale blue abyss, and jellyfish drifting peacefully through it below.
Though they appeared swept along by the current, that wasn’t quite right.
In their own way, they extended their tentacles freely against the waves of the world.
Delicate and seemingly fragile, jellyfish, yet in harsher worlds, flexibility became the means of survival.
Creatures that knew how to bend softly displayed their own vibrant presence.
The cool blue light seemed cold at first glance, but sunlight breaking through the waves illuminated the jellyfish’s smooth surface.
Painted with a glossy finish, the jellyfish seemed to emit light themselves.
“It’s clear enough that it’s a fine work even just looking at it?”
Myung-hee offered a brief compliment.
It had certainly been worth taking Ye-ji to the Aquarium.
The mystery and cruelty of the sea, and the vast freedom felt within it.
It was a work that would thoroughly satisfy her son’s tastes.
At Myung-hee’s words, Ye-ji seemed to think of something, then reached out and touched the painting on the wall.
In the piece hung with its corner pointing upward, the jellyfish seemed to be swimming upward.
As if trying to rise into the narrow space above.
Watching the jellyfish attempting to navigate such difficult terrain, Myung-hee felt a strange spiritual consolation.
No matter how grueling the circumstance, to those who observe, such movements appear endlessly elegant and beautiful.
She wished her own life, spent always in pursuit of propriety and honor, might appear so to others.
That was how she truly felt.
But seeing Myung-hee gaze intently at the work, Ye-ji unhesitatingly rotated the piece sideways.
A square canvas, now with the same horizontal and vertical alignment as the other works.
“….”
Yet the painting didn’t feel discordant in the slightest.
The direction of the light changed, and the jellyfish that had been ascending tilted gently to the side.
Though she’d witnessed the direct difference before her eyes, it felt as if it had become an entirely different work.
‘Freedom.’
If what she’d felt in the previous orientation was the intensity of navigating through a harsh world.
Now it had transformed into a completely serene sensation, radiating peaceful liberty.
The layered paint, bent by the light, cast softer shadows as the angle shifted.
The work that had shown strong contrast through light and shadow became altogether more subdued.
“Depending on the direction and perspective, the feeling you get from viewing it will differ.”
Ye-ji explained, using the difference she’d just demonstrated as an example.
“Everyone is like that, aren’t they? With all the time they’ve lived and the worlds they’ve inhabited, they carry many different facets.”
Ye-ji added succinctly about the work’s thematic consciousness.
“Probably in my work too, which direction and what feeling each person experiences will vary entirely depending on the viewer. I’d really want you to mention that aspect when gifting it.”
Listening to Ye-ji’s words, Myung-hee fell into thought.
“If you could find out which angle that person prefers… then would you be able to tell what kind of person they are?”
Her second son was someone whose inner thoughts were difficult to fathom.
He neither rejected all support nor actively received it.
Maintaining an ambiguous distance, her son was difficult to approach even for someone running a major corporation.
Though Ye-ji didn’t know the full story, she smiled softly and nodded.
“At least you could tell what kind of emotion has meaning for them?”
Myung-hee, meeting her gaze, also nodded.
Then she picked up her phone and asked.
“Could you give me your account number?”
Ah, payment for the work.
Though she hadn’t expected it to be transferred so immediately, Ye-ji nodded and recited the numbers.
Beep—
Shortly after checking the deposit notification, Ye-ji’s eyes widened.

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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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