Brilliant Ideas Episode #16: Lee Bul

The 60s in Korea was truly a tumultuous time. Yet reeling from the Korean War, a military coup broke out in May 16 of 1961, and everything was in a state of chaos. At the time, Lee Bul's parents were ostracized for their political stance, as it was a sensitive issue in the circumstance of the time. Her parents had to live as political fugitives, unable to settle and were subjected to the penal system. As a result, Lee was burdened from a young age with the task of providing for the family. To complicate matters even further, "Guilt by association" was an actual law in force at the time. Once convicted for a political crime, individuals including their family members were prohibited from participating in any group activities involving 10 or more people, severely limiting the family's scope of social activities. Such an oppressive environment made for a less-than blissful childhood, and the young artist longed for freedom.
Art provided a means for Lee to find freedom. The military regime, under which Lee spent most of her adolescence, allowed only a single unifying ideology. Lee wished to be free of such oppression, and it was in art that she found answers which were more special than others. However, the art school that Lee entered was unlike the ideal institution that she had imagined. Lee had dreamt of a school environment where she would be free to explore ideologies however what she discovered was not open discussions, but a cookie-cutter conformist curriculum.

Jean-François Lyotard, the postmodern sociologist from France develops his thought on the argument that grand-narratives are untenable. Grand-narratives, or metanarratives, are epic frameworks that aid in the understanding of all history. Lyotard was vocally critical of metanarratives, labeling them as despotic in their claim of truth, a violent totalitarian stance ignorant of diversity.
Lee's first monument Mon Grand Récit(2005~) embodies Lyotard's thought that grand narratives (Le Grand Récit) of progress and liberation are no longer possible. Drawing from her keen interest in utopian architecture by modern architects, Lee navigates the discourse on utopia in twentieth century architecture, presenting her own personal experiences into a landscape.

The artist’s two works recently presented at the MMCA Hyundai Motor Series are on the continued trajectory of such utopia. Civitas Solis II(2014), which starts the exhibition, featured a labyrinth that was low enough to allow relatively easy navigation through it, but because it was made of mirrors, it traps the navigator with a different challenge. With mirrors covering all sides of the exhibition, the slightest movement by each and every visitor is reflected in all direction. Within the exhibition space, Lee blends the two separate experiences of the human instinct to seek a path, with the individual self-awareness presented through reflections. By doing so, a myriad of questions are presented, such as the “strange and complex feeling” that transpires between instinct and identity upon walking out of the mirror-maze.

Korean artist Lee Bul, born in 1964, is a leading figure in the contemporary art world. In 1997, when she was invited to an exhibition at the Museum of Modern Art in New York, she featured a raw fish decorated with spangles. The stench of the decomposing fish quickly spread out to other exhibitions so the work had to be removed before the opening of the exhibition. However this brought immediate attention towards her works. The artist then developed her famous ‘Cyborg’ series which placed her among the emerging artists of the time. Lee Bul, who also represented the Korean Pavilion at the Venice Biennale in 1999, in her early days explored themes that break conventions through provocative performances and installations. Later Lee extended the themes of her work with the ‘Mon Grand Récit’ series addressing memories with history. Lee has had exhibitions around the world, including the MoMa, the New Museum of Contemporary Art, the Guggenheim Museum, Centre Georges Pompidou, and the Tokyo Mori Art Museum. Last year, in the inaugural MMCA Hyundai Motor Series, she presented two new large-scale works, <Civitas Solis> (2014) and <Aubade III> (2014). As the first from the series to be exhibited overseas, the <Aubade III> is being presented at Palais de Tokyo in Paris.