Haegue Yang

2.1. Birth and Family Background

Yang was born in Seoul, South Korea, on December 12, 1971. Her father, Hansoo Yang (born 1945, Seoul), was a journalist, and her mother, Misoon Kim (born 1945, Incheon), was a writer. Both parents were actively involved in the Minjung Movement, a South Korean social and political movement. Her father's career was significantly impacted by political events; he was dismissed from his position at The Dong-a Ilbo along with 160 colleagues for protesting censorship under Park Chung-hee's authoritarian regime, subsequently working for an international construction company in countries like Libya and Liberia during the Jungdong (Middle East) boom, which saw many South Korean workers migrate to the Gulf region. This familial background and exposure to social and political activism provided a unique context for Yang's early life.

2.2. Education and Early Career

Yang pursued her artistic education diligently, beginning in South Korea before moving to Germany. She received her Bachelor of Fine Arts (B.F.A.) in sculpture from Seoul National University in 1994. In 1995, she relocated to Germany to further her studies at Städelschule in Frankfurt, where she was mentored by artist Georg Herold. During this period, she also undertook an exchange program at Cooper Union in New York City from 1996 to 1997. She completed her Master's degree (Meisterschüler) from Städelschule in 1999.

After graduating, Yang began her professional artistic career in the late 1990s. Her first exhibition outside of Städelschule was held at rraum, an alternative exhibition space in Frankfurt. Her inaugural solo show took place in 2000 at Barbara Wien's gallery in Berlin. An early challenge with selling her work, leading to storage difficulties, ironically inspired one of her notable early installations, Storage Piece (2004), which consisted of a pile of crates filled with her artworks on shipping pallets. Since 2017, she has served as a professor of Fine Arts at Städelschule. She currently lives and works primarily in Berlin and Seoul, with her main studio located in Kreuzberg, Germany.

3.1. Materials and Techniques

Yang employs a diverse range of materials, often transforming mundane household objects and industrial components into sculptural elements. These materials include drying racks, lightbulbs, yarn, electrical cables, and Venetian blinds. Her interest in domestic objects partly stems from her upbringing in Korea during the 1970s and 1980s. She often combines these objects with additional sensorial components, such as steam from humidifiers, temperature shifts generated by heaters and air conditioners, and diffused smells, as seen in iterations of her "Series of Vulnerable Arrangements" (2006-2008). Nicholas Bourriaud, an art curator and critic, argues that despite the variety of techniques and mediums-including sculpture, installation, collage, photography, video, and performance-Yang's work is fundamentally sculptural in its exploration of the body's presence in space. Her work often finds new meanings for commercial products outside their typical functional uses.

Yang's artistic style is considered to navigate between minimalism and conceptual art, creating a "modernist paradox." She introduces a "sense of distance" to defamiliarize her modernist inspirations, promoting an "anachronistic lens" to view present conditions and revise the understanding of modernist abstraction. While she acknowledges her work's conceptual nature, she advocates for a redefinition of conceptual art's role in contemporary practice. Yang maintains that abstraction in her work does not negate narrative but instead enables it without setting limits. Art historian Joan Kee notes Yang's sustained attention to morphology and structure, defining her interest in formalism.

3.2. Core Themes and Concepts

Central to Yang's work are themes of individual and collective identity, displacement, isolation, and the formation of community. She approaches these subjects by embracing vulnerability, believing that it can mobilize an "unusual strength to sympathize with others." A key aspect of her conceptual approach is the deliberate ambiguity she maintains in her work, preventing it from being tied to a single identity based on gender, race, or geography. Her installations encourage viewers to interact physically, perceptually, and conceptually, fostering a "communicative way of sharing life" that allows individuals to "imagine events with others" within an intervening space. Yang's work begins from personal and subjective experiences and observations, utilizing everyday objects to prompt the audience's senses and thoughts without explicitly explaining or persuading them. While her sculptures, such as Sallim (2009), can touch upon gender issues through references to housework, they often carry multiple layers of meaning extending to themes like religion, immigration, and class. Yang also challenges the critical emphasis on her diasporic status in interpreting her practice. In considering the relationship between aesthetics and politics, she cites Félix González-Torres, noting that the "best thing about aesthetics is that the politics which permeate it are totally invisible."

3.3. Sensory Engagement and Light

Yang's installations are notable for their engagement of multiple senses, transforming exhibition spaces into immersive environments. She incorporates light, sound, scent, and tactile materials to reorient and recalibrate viewers' perceptions. This sensory approach is evident in her use of bells, moving theater lights, and scent diffusers. Light, in particular, plays a crucial role in her installations, capable of claiming physical space as a distinct, even anthropomorphic, object. In works like Mountains of Encounter (2008), moving spotlights imitate searchlights and create shifting shadows.

3.4. Historical and Biographical References

Yang frequently weaves references to historical figures, authors, filmmakers, and personal or collective memories into her installations, creating intricate narratives. For instance, her Venetian blind installation Red Broken Mountainous Labyrinth (2008) alludes to the meeting of Korean independence fighter Kim San and American journalist Nym Wales. Similarly, Lethal Love (2008) references the German Green Party leader Petra Kelly and former Bundeswehr General Gert Bastian.

Beyond historical figures, Yang references authors like Korean-Japanese essayist Suh Kyungsik, Primo Levi, George Orwell, and Marguerite Duras, as well as filmmakers such as Nagisa Ōshima. Her interest in works by or about diasporic figures stems from her research into individuals like Suh, who wrote about Levi, and her contemplation of parallels between seemingly disparate figures across different geographies and times. Yang is less concerned with establishing direct connections between them; instead, she explores the "gaps between them that allow her to transform it into an area of productive fiction." This approach, exploring the "area of productive fiction," enables her to examine the intersections of public and private life.

3.5. Movement and Migration

The theme of movement is central to many of Yang's sculptures, manifest either through the use of inherently mobile materials, such as moving theater lights in her Venetian blind pieces, or through the creation of kinetic works requiring performer interaction, like Rotating Notes--Dispersed Episodes I-V (2013). Artworks that reference diasporic figures and multiple geographies, such as Coordinates of Speculative Solidarity (2019), also explore the movement of individuals across national borders and reflect on the divisions created by such boundaries.

4.1. Venetian Blinds Installations

Yang's use of Venetian blinds is perhaps her most iconic material choice, allowing her to manipulate light, space, and viewer perspective. These large-scale installations filter light, segment space, and require audiences to find multiple viewpoints, thus transforming the gallery environment. A notable example is Accommodating the Epic Dispersion-On Non-cathartic Volume of Dispersion (2012), which utilizes blinds to create an experience where visitors must physically, perceptually, and conceptually engage with the work.

4.2. Dress Vehicles

The Dress Vehicles (2012) series consists of sculptures made of aluminum frames covered with permeable surfaces like blinds, yarn, or macramé. These pieces are designed with handles, allowing performers to move them around the exhibition space, thus exploring themes of mobility and embodied presence.

4.3. Sonic Figures

Inspired by Oskar Schlemmer's 1922 Triadisches Ballett, the "Sonic Figures" (2013-ongoing) are intricate kinetic sculptures. They feature numerous brass-plated bells affixed to wheeled steel stands. Performers rotate these pieces using handles, causing the bells to ring and engaging the element of sound in the artwork. One such piece, Sonic Rescue Ropes, was commissioned and later acquired by M+ in Hong Kong.

4.4. The Malady of Death

Since 2010, during her residency at the Walker Art Center in Minneapolis, Yang has staged a series of performances based on the French writer Marguerite Duras' 1982 novella The Malady of Death. The language, performers, and visual components of each reading have varied, emphasizing the adaptability and reinterpretation of the text.

In December 2015, as part of Mobile M+: Live Art in Hong Kong, Yang presented The Malady of Death: Écrire et Lire, which included a staging of the novella at Sunbeam Theatre and the publication of its first Chinese translation. The performance, held over two nights, featured Hong Kong writer Hon Lai-chu reciting Duras' text, accompanied by visual elements such as a burning mosquito coil, moving lights, and intermittent projections of French actress Jeanne Balibar. The performance has also been staged at Namsan Arts Center, Seoul (2010); dOCUMENTA (13), Kassel (2013); and Performa (2023).

4.5. Sadong 30

Sadong 30 (2006) is a significant site-specific installation created at Yang's grandmother's former home in Incheon, which Yang describes as her only purely site-specific piece. This work, considered "one of Yang's first comeback pieces," emphasizes the house's ruined state-with missing windows, peeling wallpaper, and holes in the ceiling-and features household objects scattered around, aiming to evoke a "universal pain." Yang reconnected the house's electricity to power string lights, illuminating both paper origami and the accumulated dirt and debris after the house's abandonment.

4.6. Commissions and Site-Specific Works

Yang has undertaken several major commissioned and site-specific installations, showcasing her ability to respond to diverse contexts and explore social resonance.

An Opaque Wind (2015), an outdoor commission for the twelfth Sharjah Biennial, was influenced by Yang's interest in the United Arab Emirates and the historical presence of Korean workers in the region, including her own father. The outdoor component featured vent sculptures on brick and concrete pedestals, alongside a sandalwood vestibule, a satellite dish, and walls made of steel tubes and corrugated metal sheets. The indoor part, titled Fathers' Room, presented a spare room with palm mats, a mattress topper, a lamp, and community newspapers, reflecting the experiences of migrant workers.

Lingering Nous (2016) is a large-scale commissioned blind installation at the Centre Pompidou in Paris. Composed of aluminum Venetian blinds and LED tubes, this hanging structure spans three levels of the institution. The title, "Nous," refers to the human mind's capacity for understanding truth and reality, suggesting the installation's potential to explore this human capacity further.

Migratory DMZ Birds on Asymmetric Lens (2020), commissioned for the 2020-21 "Ground/work" exhibition at the Clark Art Institute, imagines an encounter between birds from New England and Korea's Demilitarized Zone (DMZ). The work draws parallels between the ecological diversity of the two regions. Unlike Yang's typical indoor sculptures made from found materials, these three outdoor sculptures scattered across the Clark's grounds consist of stone pedestals topped with 3D-printed biocompatible birdbaths for local wildlife. The birdbaths also subtly reference the sound of birds audible during the broadcast of the April 2018 inter-Korean summit.

5.1. Major International Exhibitions

Yang has frequently participated in landmark international art events, including:

• São Paulo Art Biennial (2006)
• 55th Carnegie International in Pittsburgh (2008)
• Turin Triennale (2008)
• 53rd Venice Biennale (2009), where she represented South Korea in the Korean pavilion with her solo exhibition "Condensation," which included Sallim (2009), Double and Halves-Events with Nameless Neighbors (2009), and Series of Vulnerable Arrangements-Voice and Wind (2009).
• Gwangju Biennale (2010)
• dOCUMENTA (13) in Kassel (2012), where she presented Approaching: Choreography Engineered in Never-Past Tense, an installation featuring automatically moving black aluminum blinds in an empty freight depot.
• Biennale de Lyon (2012)
• Taipei Biennial (2014)
• 12th Sharjah Biennial (2015)
• 8th Asia Pacific Triennial of Contemporary Art (2015)
• Liverpool Biennial (2018)
• Sydney Biennial (2018)
• Okayama Art Summit (2022)
• Singapore Biennale (2022)

5.2. Significant Solo Exhibitions

Yang has held numerous solo exhibitions at major art institutions and galleries globally, solidifying her international presence:

• Sadong 30 (2006) in Incheon, South Korea
• Remote Room (2007) at Galerie Barbara Wien, Berlin
• Brave New Worlds (2007) at the Walker Art Center, Minneapolis (her first exhibition in the United States)
• Asymmetric Equality (2008) at Redcat Art Center, Los Angeles
• Siblings and Twins (2008) at Portikus, Frankfurt
• Symmetric Inequality (2008) at Sala Recalde Art Center, Bilbao
• Lethal Love (2008) at Cubitt Gallery, London
• Integrity of the Insider (2009) at Walker Art Center, Minneapolis
• Voice and Wind (2010) at New Museum, New York
• Voice Over Three (2010) at Artsonje Center, Seoul
• Closures (2010) at Barbara Wien Lukatsch Gallery, Berlin
• Arrivals (2011) at Kunsthaus Bregenz, Austria, featuring works like Fishing (1995), Unfolding Places (2004), Restrained Courage (2004), Squandering Negative Spaces (2006), Gymnastics of the Foldables (2006), Three Kinds in Transition (2008), her Venetian blind installation Cittadella (2011), and Warrior Believer Lover (2011), which consisted of thirty-three light sculptures accompanied by Igor Stravinsky's Le Sacre du Printemps. The title alluded to the end of a long journey and her emergence as a globally recognized artist.
• The Art and Technique of Folding the Land (2011) at the Aspen Art Museum, referencing Daoist and Western folklore ideas of traversing great distances.
• The Sea Wall (2011), a duo exhibition with Félix González-Torres at Arnolfini, Bristol
• Teacher of Dance (2011) at Modern Art Oxford, Oxford
• Unrealistic to generalise (2003) in Paris
• Air and Water (2002) at Dresdner Bank, Frankfurt
• Sonderfarben (2001) at Darmstadt City Museum, Darmstadt
• Richard-Meier-Avenue (2001) at Siemens Art Program, Munich
• AStA VIPs (2001) at Art Forum, Berlin
• Lacquer Paintings 2000 (2000) at Galerie Barbara Wien, Berlin
• Approval and Negation (2000) at Galerie Kolster, Frankfurt
• Blue Meadow - Colorful Language (2000) at Künstlerhaus Mousonturm, Frankfurt
• Hamburgefonstiv (1999) at Forum 1822 der Frankfurter Sparkasse, Frankfurt
• Approaching: Choreography Engineered in Never-Past Tense (2012) at dOCUMENTA (13), Kassel
• Accommodating the Epic Dispersion-On Non-cathartic Volume of Dispersion (2012) at Haus der Kunst München, Munich
• Opened (2012) at Galerie Chantal Crousel La Douane, Paris
• The Tank; Art in Action (2012) at Tate Modern, London
• Haegue Yang-Scrolls Cozy (2012) at Kunsthalle Marcel Duchamp, Cully, Switzerland
• Multi Faith Room (2012) at Greene Naftali, New York
• Anachronistic Layers of Dispersion (2013) at Henry Art Gallery, Seattle
• Honesty Printed on Modesty (2013) at Singapore Tyler Print Institute, Singapore
• Journal of Echomimetic Motions (2013) at Bergen Kunsthall, Bergen, Norway
• Journal of Bouba/kiki (2013) at Glasgow Sculpture Studios, Glasgow, Scotland
• Corrugated Totems with Glitter Dance (2013) at Vitrines sur l'Art - Museums of Strasbourg, Galeries Lafayette, Strasbourg
• Family of Equivocations (2013) at Aubette 1928 and Museum of Modern and Contemporary Art, Strasbourg
• Ovals and Circles (2013) at Galerie Chantal Crousel, Paris
• Art Wall: Haegue Yang (2013) at The Institute of Contemporary Art, Boston
• Follies, mehrfach: Gabriel Lester - Haegue Yang (2014) at Bonn Kunstverein, Bonn
• Haegue Yang: Come Shower or Shine, It Is Equally Blissful (2015) at UCCA Center for Contemporary Art, Beijing
• Temporary Permanent (2015) at Galerie Wien Lukatsch, Berlin
• Sample Book (2015) at dépendance, Brussels
• Shooting the Elephant Thinking the Elephant (2015) at Leeum, Samsung Museum of Art, Seoul
• Quasi-Pagan Seasonal Shift (2016) at Aïshti by the Sea, Antelias, Lebanon
• Quasi-Pagan Modern (2016) at Galeries Lafayette Hausmann, Paris
• Lingering Nous (2016) at Centre Pompidou, Paris
• An Opaque Wind Park in Six Folds (2016) at Serralves Museum of Contemporary Art, Porto, Portugal
• Quasi-Pagan Serial (2016) at Hamburger Kunsthalle, Hamburg
• Quasi-Pagan Minimal (2016) at Greene Naftali, New York
• Quasi-ESP (2017) at Galerie Chantal Crousel, Paris
• Silo of Silence - Clicked Core (2017) at KINDL - Centre for Contemporary Art, Berlin
• VIP's Union - Phase I (2017) at Kunsthaus Graz, Graz
• Four Times Sol LeWitt UpsideDown, Version Point to Point (2017) at Maison Hermès Dosan Park, Seoul
• Ornament and Abstraction (2017) at kurimanzutto, Mexico City
• Haegue Yang (2017) at mezzaterra11 - flat gallery, Belluno
• Chronotopic Traverses (2018) at LA PANACÉE - MoCo, Montpellier
• Tightrope Walking and its Wordless Shadow (2018) at La Triennale di Milano, Fundazione Furla, Bologna
• Triple Vita Nestings (2018) at Institute of Modern Art, Brisbane; Govett-Brewster Art Gallery, New Plymouth
• ETA: 1994 - 2018 (2018), a retrospective at Museum Ludwig, Cologne
• VIP's Union - Phase II (2018) at Kunsthaus Graz, Graz
• In the Cone of Uncertainty (2019) at The Bass Museum, Miami
• Forum for Drone Speech - Singapore Simulation (2019) at National Gallery Singapore, Singapore
• Handles (2019) at MoMA, New York
• Intermediate Fiction-Haegue Yang (2019) at Winsing Art Place, Taipei
• When The Year 2000 Comes (2019) at Kukje Gallery, Seoul
• Tracing Movement (2019) at South London Gallery, London
• The Cone of Concern (2020) at Museum of Contemporary Art and Design (MCAD), Manila
• Strange Attractors (2020) at Tate St Ives, St Ives
• Emergence (2020) at Art Gallery of Ontario, Toronto
• MMCA Hyundai Motor Series 2020: Haegue Yang - O₂&H₂O (2020) at National Museum of Modern and Contemporary Art, Seoul
• Ground/work (2020) at Clark Art Institute, Williamstown
• Dress Vehicles/Eclectic Totemic (2020) at kurimanzutto, Mexico City
• Continuous Reenactments (2023) at Helsinki Art Museum, Helsinki
• The Great Forgetfulness (2023) at National Sculpture Factory, Cork, Ireland
• Hibernation Hanok (2023) at Kukje Gallery, Seoul
• Changing From From To From (2023) at National Gallery of Australia, Canberra
• Several Reenactments (2023) at S.M.A.K., Ghent, Belgium
• Quasi-Colloquial (2023) at Pinacoteca, São Paulo, Brazil
• VIP Student Council (2022) at Galerie Chantal Crousel, Paris
• Mesmerizing Mesh - Paper Leap and Resonating Habitat (2022) at Galerie Chantal Crousel, Paris
• Quasi-Legit (2022) at Smart Museum of Art, University of Chicago, Chicago
• Mesmerizing Mesh (2022) at Kukje Gallery, Seoul
• Quasi-Legit (2022) at Kukje Gallery, Busan
• Mesmerizing Mesh - Paper Leap and Sonic Guard (2022) at Galerie Barbara Wien, Berlin
• Double Soul (2022) at National Gallery of Denmark, Copenhagen