Installation view at carlier | gebauer, Madrid, Spain

Artist: Kyungah Ham (함경아)
Exhibition Dates: June 21 - July 27, 2019
Exhibition Venue: Carlier Gebauer Gallery (스페인 마드리드 카를리에르 게바우어 갤러리)
Website: www.carliergebauer.com/exhibitions/abstract_poetry_weapon_soccer_paintings_by_soccer_ball_bouncing_over_crocodile_river

Kyungah Ham is the subject of a solo exhibition titled Abstract, Poetry Weapon / Soccer Paintings by soccer ball bouncing over Crocodile River at carlier | gebauer in Madrid, Spain, through July 27, 2019. Ham explores the notion of power in an extrinsic context by working across painting, installation, video, and performance, often incorporating satirical elements to what would otherwise be perceived as politically charged situations. This exhibition will include works from the artist’s signature embroidery paintings series titled SMS Series, along with the video installation Soccer Painting by the Soccer Ball Bouncing Over Crocodile River.

Ham’s works visualize a façade of reality that is part of our presence but remains invisible and expose unstable gap within a society. The artist’s representative multi-colored silk embroidery work, the SMS Series, connotes and camouflages political messages. The camouflaged images deconstruct and distort original images she has collected, which consist of visual messages in a highly abstracted form. The video work Soccer Painting by the Soccer Ball Bouncing over Crocodile River was first shown as a project for Korea Artist Prize at the National Museum of Modern and Contemporary Art, Korea, in 2016. The work features a young soccer player who has escaped North Korea and visualizes invisible vestiges of the boy’s emotions, movement and past experiences. The indefinable reality of the young boy is ultimately visualized through the materiality of the paint. Like warp and weft, the exhibition Abstract, Poetry Weapon / Soccer Paintings by soccer ball bouncing over Crocodile River inevitably interweaves the artist’s reality with that of her practice.  


함경아, 스페인 마드리드 카를리에르 게바우어 갤러리에서 개인전 《Abstract, Poetry Weapon / Soccer Paintings by soccer ball bouncing over Crocodile River》 개최

함경아는 스페인 마드리드 카를리에르 게바우어 갤러리에서 개인전 《Abstract, Poetry Weapon / Soccer Paintings by soccer ball bouncing over Crocodile River》을 개최, 오는 7월 27일까지 전시한다. 회화, 설치, 비디오, 퍼포먼스 등 다양한 장르를 통해 비-본질적인 맥락의 권력을 탐구하고, 과도한 정치성을 유희적으로 접근하는 작가 함경아는 이번 전시에서 자수회화 연작 <SMS Series>, 영상 작업 <Soccer Painting by the Soccer Ball Bouncing Over Crocodile River>를 선보인다.

함경아의 작업은 실재하지만 보이지 않는 현실의 모습과 견고하지 못한 사회의 틈새를 드러낸다. 형형색색의 실크를 사용한 그의 대표작 <SMS Series>는 정치적 메시지를 내포 및 은폐하고 있는 자수 회화 작업이다. 작품 속 카모플라주는 작가가 수집한 이미지를 알아볼 수 없게 해체하고 왜곡시켜 만들어낸 이미지로, 추상적이고 시각적인 메시지가 담겨있다. 영상 작업 <Soccer Painting by the Soccer Ball Bouncing Over Crocodile River>는 국립현대미술관 《올해의 작가》(2016)전에서 선보였던 프로젝트로, 축구선수를 꿈꾸는 탈북소년의 공차기를 통해 그의 감정과 움직임, 스쳐간 시간 등의 비가시적인 흔적들을 시각화했다. 단정지어 정의할 수 없는 한 소년의 리얼리티는 물감을 통해 총체적으로 나타난다. 이번 전시 《Abstract, Poetry Weapon / Soccer Paintings by soccer ball bouncing over Crocodile River》는 함경아가 바라보고 있는 현실과 작업의 리얼리티가 마치 씨실과 날실처럼 필연적으로 엮여있다.

[Source from carlier | gebauer press release]