Yang Hae-gue's sonic sculptures awakened

The kinetic and sonic sculptures by globally acclaimed installation artist Yang Hae-gue are being performed throughout February at the National Museum of Modern and Contemporary Art, Korea, where her fifth solo exhibition in Korea “MMCA Hyundai Motor Series 2020: Haegue Yang - O2 & H2O” is underway. 

A total of 9 pieces of the artist’s kinetic sculptures including “Sonic Domesticus,” “Sonic Clotheshorse” and “Sonic Ropes” will be activated for 15 minutes at 5 p.m. everyday throughout February with an additional performance at 7 p.m. on Wednesdays and Saturdays. The performance is choreographed by Park Sang-yun.

The exhibition, held in partnership with the Hyundai Motor Company, opened on Sept. 29, unveiling 40 works by the artist, including those created for the show.

Her new work, “Sonic Clotheshorses,” is a laundry drying rack whose frame is enshrouded with bells as though shaping a body. She came up with more than 40 different shapes of racks, and the seventh and eighth shapes are on display at the exhibition.

“Yang understands ‘Sonic Clotheshorses’ as a game, which will end by exhausting its variations without winning or losing. Implicated by the equipment of handles on all sides, ‘Sonic Clotheshorse’ inherently contains a possible performativity between a human performer and objects. Handles here become an important metaphor of a mediation between the human body and the objects, and activating them results in a movement,” the artist‘s note on her official website says.

The exhibition runs through Feb. 28 on a reservation basis, which can be made at kguide.kr/mmca001/. MMCA Seoul is currently hosting “MMCA Hyundai Motor Series 2020: Haegue Yang - O2 & H2O,” “Korea Artist Prize 2020,” “Lee Seung Taek’s Non-Art: The Inversive Act” and “MMCA Collection Highlights 2020+.”

By Park Yuna (yunapark@heraldcorp.com)