Haegue Yang’s The Intermediates (2015–ongoing) are placed within the wallpaper piece Incubation and Exhaustion. Embellished for the biennial, Incubation and Exhaustion – Version Istanbul incorporates Medusas, feathered angels, ‘broken’ tulips and adapted Secchi disks. Scenographic elements such as moving lights, scented gym balls and sound complete the immersive setting. In April 2018, North Korean leader met South Korean President for an inter-Korean summit in a demilitarised zone in the middle of the Korean peninsula. In the live press broadcast of the half-hour private discussion, nothing but the song of native birds and camera clicks was audible. The audio from this historical meeting is incorporated into Yang’s installation.
Haegue Yang (b. 1971, Seoul, South Korea) lives and works in Berlin and Seoul. Interweaving political narratives with materiality and ornamentation, Yang often uses industrially produced items and labor-intensive handicraft techniques to create installations that are conceptually complex and sensually immersive. Recent solo exhibitions include Tightrope Walking and Its Wordless Shadow, Triennale di Milano (2018), ETA 1994–2018, Museum Ludwig, Cologne (2018), and Lingering Nous, Centre Pompidou, Paris (2016). Her work has been included in numerous group exhibitions internationally, including the 21st Biennale of Sydney (2018), dOCUMENTA (13), Kassel (2012), and the 53rd Venice Biennale (2009).
EXHIBITED WORKS
Incubation and Exhaustion – Version Istanbul, 2019
Volcano scented PVC gym balls (diameter each 55 cm; 65 cm; 75 cm), two moving spotlights, DMX controller
Courtesy the artist.
Commissioned by the 16th Istanbul Biennial.
Presented with the support of Institut für Auslandsbeziehungen and Embassy of Korea in Ankara.
Incubation and Exhaustion, 2018
In collaboration with Studio Manuel Raeder
Digital colour print, laser prints, Perspex, found plants
Dimensions variable
Courtesy the artists.
Presented with the support of Institut für Auslandsbeziehungen and Embassy of Korea in Ankara.
Sound element
Digital sound file, 29’55’’ loop
A live broadcast recording made at the Inter-Korean Summit in the Korean Demilitarized Zone on April 27, 2018 included by permission of the Presidential Office of the Republic of Korea.
Sound element
Digital sound file, 3’35’’ loop
10 synthetic voices saying, in Turkish, that certain accents and Turkish dialects are not available in Text to Speech (TTS) software. The voices were created by converting the International Phonetic Alphabet (IPA) into spoken Turkish with speech inflections associated with different locations (Ankara, Cyprus, Diyarbakir, Izmir, Thrace, Tokat, and Trabzon) and languages (Kurmanji Kurdish, Romanian, and Russian). These voices were arranged in a sequence and looped.
The Intermediate – Dangling Hairy Hug, 2018
Powder-coated steel frame, powdercoated mesh, steel wire rope, plastic twine
230 x 70 x 73 cm
Courtesy the artist.
The Intermediate – Dragged Hairy Hug, 2018
Powder-coated steel frame, powdercoated mesh, steel wire rope, caster, plastic twine
136 x 105 x 66 cm
Courtesy the artist.
The Intermediate–Occitanian Vagabond, 2018
Powder-coated steel frame, powdercoated mesh, casters, plastic twine, jute twine, fabric samples, pom-poms, metal rings, metal grommets
191 x 75 x 70 cm
Courtesy the artist.
