DMZ Un-Do
2020
Digital color print on self-adhesive reflective and self-adhesive vinyl film
Dimensions variable
Courtesy of the artist; Kukje Gallery
Installation view of MMCA Hyundai Motor Series 2020: Haegue Yang – O2 & H2O, National Museum of Modern and Contemporary Art, Korea, Seoul, South Korea, 2020
Photo: Cheolki Hong. Image provided by MMCA.
Installation view of Checkpoint: Border Views From Korea, Kunstmuseum Wolfsburg, Wolfsburg, Germany, 2022
Photo: Photo: Marek Kruszewski
excerpt from the essay published in MMCA Hyundai Motor Series 2020: Haegue Yang – O2 & H2O, National Museum of Modern and Contemporary Art, Korea and Hyunsil Publishing.
Yang’s wallpaper works have evolved from the early collages of her artworks together with referenced objects to convoluted imageries based on research into a specific locality. They often become fantastical habitats for Yang’s hybrid sculptures. The collapsed temporality and spatiality, to which the artist refers to as “productive anachronism,” are merged into DMZ Un-Do (2020) as a two-dimensionality.
DMZ Un-Do depicts pollen, robot bees, solar panels, a portable electric fan, a hydroelectric power dam, an electricity transmission tower, lightning, and a Lorenz attractor. They unfold the movement of matter and fluids or the transference of energy. This bird’s-eye view renders the complex spatiality of Demilitarized Zone (DMZ), bearing the multiple interpretations of the Korean work title Bi-Hang (Un-Do) of 非行 derailment, 卑行 contemptible behavior, and 飛行 flying in midair.
The miscellany of references summoned from the material world and ecosystem into the landscape of the Korean Peninsula send feedback to one another on the boundary between natural phenomena and artificial technology. The waves of force generated through the condensation and division of matter are amplified through their juxtaposition with images showing the peculiar spatiality of the DMZ.
Exhibition history
Checkpoint: Border Views From Korea, Kunstmuseum Wolfsburg, Wolfsburg, Germany, 2022
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