Biography:
Widely recognized as one of the foremost Korean artists of her generation, Lee Bul (b. 1964, Yeongju, KR) has been the subject of solo shows at major museums throughout the world, including the New Museum of Contemporary Art, New York, US (2002); Fondation Cartier pour l’art Contemporain, Paris, FR (2007); Mori Art Museum, Tokyo, JP (2012); Palais de Tokyo, Paris, FR (2015); Hayward Gallery, London, UK (2018); and Martin Gropius-Bau, Berlin, DE (2018).
Lee made an early break with her academic training (BFA in sculpture, Hongik University) with provocative, multidisciplinary works exploring themes of beauty, corruption, and decay. Now in the fourth decade of her career, she is seen as a pioneer for her iconoclastic performances and multi-sensory installations pushing the formal and conceptual boundaries of visual art. Since the early 2000s, her work has engaged with themes of utopian modernity, the historical avant-garde in art and architecture, and the rise and fall of progressivist projects to re-invent the world, informed by her experiences growing up the daughter of dissidents during a period of turbulent political and social transformation.
Lee’s work is held in prominent collections throughout the world, including the Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, US; Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, New York, US; Walker Art Center, Minneapolis; US; Tate Modern, London, UK; National Gallery of Canada, Ottawa, CA; M+, Hong Kong, HK; Mori Art Museum, Tokyo, JP; and Leeum Museum of Art, Seoul, KR. She is the recipient of an Honorary Doctorate from the School of the Art Institute of Chicago, US (2022); Ho-Am Prize in the Arts (2019); Insignia of Officier, Ordre des Arts et des Lettres (2016); the Gwangju Biennale Foundation’s Noon Award (2014); and a Menzione d’Onore (1999) for her contribution to the 48th Venice Biennale.
Works:
Lee Bul, Aubade V, 2019
casted steel (collected from demolished checkpoint in DMZ), optium museum acrylic, electronic display board, LED light (bulb, strip, bar), LED socket, CPU, DC-SMPS, dimmer (DC, AC), terminal box, magnet, black PVC coated wire, electric wire (black, transparent)
400 x 300 cm
Courtesy of the artist and Galerie Thaddaeus Ropac, Salzburg, Paris, London
Premiered at the 2019 edition of the Venice Biennale, Aubade V is a large-scale casted steel tower. Its design incorporates inspirational elements from the ideals of modernist architecture, evocative of projects such as Tatlin’s Constructivist Tower or the Eiffel Tower. The steel structure is made from barbed wire debris collected from a guard’s post in the Korean Demilitarized Zone (DMZ), which was demolished in 2018 as part of an inter-Korean military accord. Attached to the structure are various light signals that flicker anxiously, failing to communicate their message to the audience, as many will not be able to decode—or even recognize—Morse Code or the International Code of Signals. Moreover, the English text in LED lights may appear more familiar, yet it states: “For the next 1 million years, the cycle will carry the obliquity between 22˚ 13' 44" and 24˚ 20' 50",” delaying direct or easy understanding. Lee Bul’s Aubade V elicits insecurity and uncertainty, rather than utopian or heroic ambitions.
