Jeena Shin

Jeena Shin lives and works in Tāmaki Makaurau Auckland. Her work explores the quiet complexity of geometric abstraction, often drawing attention to the relationship between surface, structure, and perception. Working primarily in black, white, and subtle tones of grey, Shin builds her paintings through intricate, hand-painted systems that appear digital at first glance but are rooted in the labour of repetition and precision.

In Time-Delay I, tonal shards float across a pristine white ground, some nearly disappearing into the surface, others just catching the light. The composition is rhythmic yet fragmentary—its forms suggesting a kind of slowed-down motion, like the freeze-frame of a shattered reflection or a collapsed architectural plane. There is no centre, no clear orientation; the painting resists hierarchy, inviting a non-linear experience of time and space.

Shin’s work often engages with architecture, both in her large-scale wall paintings and on canvas. Her compositions emerge from a deep sensitivity to environment and attention, unfolding slowly as the viewer moves across them. Time-Delay I is a painting that rewards patience—it hovers just at the edge of visibility, revealing its logic gradually through sustained looking.

In a world saturated with noise and immediacy, Shin’s work offers a different tempo. It reminds us that clarity can come through stillness, and that structure—no matter how abstract—can hold space for reflection and presence.