Big Mac: Same Product and Same Quality, Video, 5’18”, 2021
This video focuses on the Big Mac index which is used as an indicator of the purchasing power of each country (and working hours). When I was selling hamburger in 2013, Seoul, South Korea, the audience/public was the person who could buy a hamburger easily. However, a hamburger can have a different meaning depending on the circumstances (such as economic, social, cultural, and political aspects) of the country where the hamburger is sold. Through this artwork, the artist asks a fundamental question: is it possible to impart a different meaning to the exact same product? While providing the same quality, a Big Mac can have different meanings to consumers depending on the place where they live. In addition, the format of this artwork shows how the globalized company standardizes its employees based on a generalized manual.
빅맥: 똑같은 상품 똑같은 품질, 비디오, 5’18”, 2021
이 작업은 각 나라의 구매력 지표로서 사용되는 빅맥 지수에 초점을 맞춘다. 2013년 한국의 서울에서 내가 햄버거 작품을 팔 때, 내 관객은 햄버거를 손쉽게 사 먹을 수 있는 사람들이었다. 그러나 햄버거는 햄버거가 팔리는 각 나라의 경제, 사회, 문화, 그리고 정치적 양상과 같은 상황에 따라 다른 의미를 지닐 수 있다. 이 작업을 통해, 나는 근본적인 질문을 던진다: 정확히 같은 상품에 다른 의미를 부여할 수 있을까? 동일한 품질을 제공하면서도 빅맥은 그들이 사는 장소에 따라 소비자에게 다른 의미를 가질 수 있다. 또한, 이 작품의 형식은 어떻게 글로벌화된 기업이 일반화된 설명서를 기반으로 그들의 직원들을 표준화하는 지를 보여준다.
Ordinary but not ordinary, Video, 4’53”, 2021
COVID-19 pandemic has changed our ordinary lives and concluded new normal lives. Wearing a face mask has become an ordinary rule for living and skipping handshakes as well. COVID-19 again brings the word ‘New normal’ back―an unfamiliar situation has become standard due to a catastrophic historical event. The purpose of this video work is to define and wrap up the year 2020. Ovals in the video mean never-ending situations which resemble the shape of a face mask. Although situations have been drastically changed because of the global disease outbreak, the drawing in the video displays ordinary people who never stop but keep their lives going on by adapting to the new normal lifestyle. They never give up but strive for getting back to normal.
일상적이지만 일상적이지 않은, 비디오, 4’53”, 2021
코로나는 우리의 일상적인 삶을 바꾸어 놓고 새로운 일상을 만들어냈다. 새로운 일상이란 마스크를 쓰거나 악수를 생략하는 것을 뜻한다. 코로나는 ‘뉴 노멀(new normal)’이라는 단어를 우리에게 다시 상기시키는데, 이는 친숙하지 않은 상황이 비극적인 역사적 사건으로 인해 일반적인 상황이 됨을 뜻하는 단어이다. 이 비디오 작업의 목적은 2020년을 정의하고 마무리 하는 것이다. 비디오에서 등장하는 타원 형태는 코로나로 인해 쓰게된 마스크의 형상을 닮은, 끝이나지 않은 현재의 상황을 의미한다. 코로나 발생으로 인해 우리 일상의 전반적인 상황이 바뀌었음에도 불구하고, 이 영상 내의 드로잉은 그들의 일상을 멈추지 않고 ‘뉴 노멀(new normal)’ 생활 방식에 적응하며 삶을 영위해가는 보통의 평범한 사람들을 나타낸다. 그들/우리는 포기하지 않고 보통의 평범한 일상으로 돌아가기 위해 노력한다.
A bird (Description), 2020
A bird is standing on the ground. The bird looks around and soon flaps and flies up into the sky. The bird begins its journey to find its ideal. During the journey, the bird faces varied difficulties: high mountains, storms, thunder, lightning, and sun. Despite the difficult journey, the bird finds something. The bird lands and confronts birds that have huge wings, sharp claws, pointed beaks. The threatening birds surround the bird. The bird escapes from them, realizing that it is not the ideal that the bird is looking for. Since the bird is already so exhausted by the hard journey, the bird sits on the ground, burrows deep in its face, and soon falls asleep while it is snowing. After taking a long and deep sleep, the bird wakes up at the sound of a flock of birds flying overhead the bird. The bird raises up its head and stretches out its legs. The bird flaps its wings, kicks on the ground, and flies to the sky. The bird flaps its wings differently than in the past and flies in a different direction than before.
A bird, Video, 9’30’’, 1920 x 1080, 2020
This artwork combines a video with a sequence of drawings. Landscape has been applied in a broad field, from painting to filmic works. The advantage of landscape is versatile: it is a natural backdrop and filmic subject, but also expresses various emotions, circumstances, and even themes (e.g. establishing shot). While traditional visual arts exploit landscape as a picturesque setting, the landscape in this artwork helps to understand the story and represents an independent theme. In this artwork, an animated story for a bird's life merges into the film as an art form that is able to record external sequences of motion in a natural landscape.
A bird (Draft Version), Video, 5’06’’, 1920 x 1080, 2020
Narrow Road toward Narrow Gate, Video, 3’10”, 2018
Music from NVRKNW [https://soundcloud.com/earlknowsnothing]
In the present video, the ever-shaking camera, weather, eyes, and steps represent my reality and status. I always walk along narrow roads because I feel the narrowness wherever I am standing even on a broad trail or road. The narrow road is neither safe nor certain. The road makes me feel slow, pitch dark in front of my eyes, and dizzy. I am walking as if I was a quivering leaf in the wind. Walking toward the dizzy narrow gate, I feel the world surrounding me seems to move isolated from me. Nevertheless, I should keep going no matter what because it is my way, narrow, slow, and rarely chosen.
Matthew
7:13 Enter through the narrow gate. For wide is the gate and broad is the road that leads to destruction, and many enter through it.
7:14 But small is the gate and narrow the road that leads to life, and only a few find it.
Luke
13:24 Make every effort to enter through the narrow door, because many, I tell you, will try to enter and will not be able to.
Psalms
22:6 But I am a worm and not a man, scorned by men and despised by the people.
Isaiah
41:14 Do not be afraid, O worm Jacob, O little Israel, for I myself will help you, declares the LORD, your Redeemer, the Holy One of Israel.
I Think Those Things Today, Video, 4’16”, 2018
Children can be born after their parents exist. The existence of children accompanying the nonexistence of their parents is impossible. This video begins with a casual conversation among my family and overlapping narration. The dialogue happens in the car, a medium taking my family to my grandparents' graves on Thanksgiving Day. The special role makes car considered as the place to recognize my parent's existence. The moment reminds me that my parents had their parents in the past. It makes me fear from the loss of my parents in the future rather than consoling my parents in grief for the loss of their parents. There are two kinds of fear from non-existence of parents: realized fear after parents passed away, potential fear because of chance to lose my parents in the future. I end up having a selfish thought: I don’t want to feel any kind of fear from absence of my parents. The purpose of present video is to show my ironic view that I think parents' non-existence in the car.
What goes around comes around, Video, 4’05”, 2018
This video clip starts with the question of why people seek self-comforting by blaming other people for their fault, not reflecting on themselves. In the video, I assemble a BB gun. The gun is aimed at walking family, cigarette, and other objects not related to my problem. The gun is aimed at you watching present video now. At first, I shift my blame on the family although I am already over 14 and well grown-up. It tells I blame not myself but other person or objects for self-dissatisfaction, pessimistic view, and fault by aiming at them. The BB gun might be loaded or not, which means aiming itself is important no matter whether it has a bullet or not. From the irresponsible behavior, audience will agree that we should, at any cost, solve our problems by ourselves. In the end, to face my problem, I aim myself and exit. The last scene tells the situation remains unsolved while I understand who has the responsibility for it.
Border, Video, 3’11’’, 2014
This work records the border on which I am standing and walking day after day. I feel my position is on the border dividing my life into reality and ideal which it is hard for me to balance between two different lives. The discrepancy even triggers a sense of alienation. There are two solutions to the situation: Blur the boundary or accept grey area as an independent area. By blurring the boundary, I can feel belonging of somewhere. Or, I can make boundary intentionally so that I don't want to belong anywhere. Either of the solutions has an identical priority, recognizing the border. Then, I have a target to break. The video hopes to deliver two messages: the fact there exist various unseen boundaries around us, the fact that we should eliminate these uncomfortable boundaries by either blurring them or accepting current position.
Moon Light, Video, 2’24’’, 2014
In South Korea as well as around the world, there exist lots of songs for the Moon. The moon was always intimate with our life. I want to change moonlight's meaning to other meaning using a homonym. In South Korea, ‘light’ and ‘crazy’ have the same pronunciation. So, I replace 'light' with 'crazy' but their sounds are same. Thus, ‘Moonlight’ change to ‘Crazy-moon’. In the video, I become a crazy moon and act like a crazed moon. Words on T-shirts is 'moon' and background music is comprised of various songs for moon including Beethoven Piano Sonata No.14 ‘Moonlight’.