SongEun Art Space “Summer Love Part 1”

Seoul, July 10 – August 8, 2015 http://www.songeunartspace.org

A group show, featuring numerous works and artists. As the press release announced, the exhibition is a celebration of the gallery’s 5 year anniversary in its current location, presenting an overview of artists they have worked with during the years. Thus, everyone walking through the show can find something of interest, but likewise, the span of works is too different to attract the attention equally. There were works I loved, and works I didn’t quite understand and works I disliked.Choi Sungmin “Endless Tree”: Overall an interesting installation, but I found the metal grid in the middle too disrupting. It seemed to have been included as an afterthought to a technical solution. The metal grid is square shaped looks heavy, a bit like an industrial fence. The plastic balls and mesh looks very sleek, light and organic on the other hand.

Song Soo-Young “Trash-Park (Nanjido Park) and Leaf-City: A work that was funny, and meaningful and well executed. I enjoyed the lightness and seemingly transient nature of the work. Ke Seok-Min “The Stripshow _Tetris”: This work looked very cool and strict. Probably a result of some Photoshop cleaning up of a real world landscape. I could not completely decode the meaning, but it looked intriguing.

Park Hye-Min “HPARK Travel Agency”: A presentation of a fictional (or maybe real as well?) travel agency giving tours about immigrants in Korea (Indian immigrants, Chinese immigrants, etc.). All in Korean, so my understanding was limited but I wondered about the purpose. A well-meant attempt to create connections and understanding of minorities or a reproduction of the local we-and-our-foreign-friends racism? Park Jihye “Evanesce”: A single channel video with a cosmetics advertisement look, and a sentimental narrative of a ‘pure’ girl in a white dress walking in slow motion through a ‘pure’ forest, concluded by slipping from a tree trunk and falling into a pond of ‘pure’ clear water. I was wondering if this was seriously meant, or a joke on something I did not understand.Park Munhee “Three Truths” and “Her Silence”: Photo works playing with formal elements to achieve a symbolic meaning, and an installation, related to transience of time. The last room – last work of the show.