Korean artist Lee Bul transforms Hayward Gallery into futuristic landscape
An art exhibition featuring works by one of the most acclaimed contemporary artists from Asia, Lee Bul (born in 1964 in Seoul, South Korea) opened at Southbank Center’s Hayward Gallery in London on Wednesday.
Taking over the entire Hayward Gallery, this exhibition — the artist’s ¿rst major solo show in London — brings together 118 of her works from the late 1980s to the present day in order to explore the full range of her pioneering and highly inventive practice, artdaily.com reported.
Throughout her career, Lee Bul has received international recognition for her imaginative and provocative work. She draws on diverse sources that include science fiction, 20th century history, philosophy and personal experience, whilst making use of deliberately ‘clashing’ materials that range from the organic to the industrial, from silk and mother of pearl, to fiberglass and silicone.
Shaped by her experience of growing up in South Korea during a period of political upheaval, much of her work is concerned with trauma, and the way that idealism or the pursuit of perfection — bodily, political or aesthetic — might lead to failure, or disaster. Since the early 2000s, she has focused on architectural utopianism, bringing together references to both real and imagined architecture in sprawling sculptures of futuristic cityscapes.
The exhibition presents 16 works that have never been seen before, including the newly completed Scale of Tongue (2017-18), an intricate sculptural work that makes subtle reference to the Sewol Ferry Disaster of 2014; a series of silk velvet paintings; and three new works from the artist’s ongoing Anagram series, upholstered in leather and fabric.
Also on show are a range of Lee Bul’s studio drawings and sketches, which provide an insight into the artist’s creative process, and the way that her intricate three-dimensional works are developed.
In addition, the exhibition presents a new site-speci¿c installation Weep into stones (2017-18), which drapes the Hayward’s exterior walls with a subtly shimmering curtain of thousands of glass beads and Swarovski crystals.
Opening with sculptural works from the artist’s iconic Cyborg, Monster and Anagram series, ‘Lee Bul: Crashing’ also features reconstructions of the artist’s wearable fabric sculptures and documentation of her early performances, which were often staged in public places.
The exhibition also features pivotal works including ‘Majestic Splendor’ (1991-2018), an installation consisting of decaying ¿sh embroidered with sequins, beads and gold Àowers which aims to unsettle the viewer’s understanding of beauty and value; ‘Live Forever III’ (2001) — an interactive, futuristic karaoke pod; and a number of the artist’s recent immersive sculptural environments that make use of mirrored surfaces.
Taking over a section of the lower galleries is the glittering ‘Civitas Solis II’ (2014), while in the upper galleries is ‘Via Negativa II’ (2014) — a mirrored labyrinth that disrupts and disturbs our sense of space, whilst reflecting our bodies in fragmented form.
‘Lee Bul: Crashing’ culminates with ‘Willing To Be Vulnerable — Metalized Balloon’ (2015-16), a 17-meter long sculpture that resembles a Hindenburg Zeppelin, suspended above a reàective Àoor in the Hayward Gallery’s newly refurbished upper galleries.
This colossal sculpture, which references the 1937 Hindenburg disaster, is at once aspirational and optimistic and concerned with technological failure, fragmentation and destruction.
In this exhibition, Lee Bul’s work is accompanied by two timelines that explore the political landscape that has shaped much of her practice. ‘Women and Art in South Korea: 1960-2000’ explores the emergence of women’s activist movements and art in South Korea, while ‘Korean Division and the DMZ’ outlines the key events that have taken place at the border between North and South Korea from 1945 to the present day.