kimsooja.com | SelfScape

Video stills from A Needle Woman. New Delhi, Tokyo, Shanghai, New York City. SelfScape Kim Sooja & Yan Pei-Ming Kim Seung-Duk, 2000
Is there any duration in a painting? Do videos become paintings when hung in a series on a wall, which you will pass without staying very long? Does bringing Sooja's videos and Ming's landscape painting together turn them into spectacles? When you project light over a painting hung in the dark, what does it bring you? Does it turn the exhibition room into a kind of a movie theater? Do we try to challenge white with black? Darkness with light? Black box with white cube? Can we disintegrate the white cube just by erasing its walls? How does Ming's black-and-white dark landscape, alongside the bright red self-portraits, collaborate with the hieratic back side of Sooja's figure in her videos? When Sooja turns her back to the audience, does the absence of herself become a strong presence? Is Ming looking at his self-portrait in the same way as Sooja is looking at the cityscape? Are you looking at Sooja in the same way she is looking at the cityscape? Is she looking at all? When is it your turn to look? After having painted Mao as well as his own father, does Ming, in the new Autoportrait en pére in turn become a fatherly Chairman Mao? Does Sooja, with her grey clothing and her famous braided long black hair, become the so-called mysterious oriental figure? Is Ming's Paysage International more anonymous than Tokyo, Shanghai, New Delhi or New York as depicted in Sooja's videos?	Do you hear the quietness of the crowded cityscapes and the noise in the empty, deserted landscape? Is there any correspondence between the movement of the brushstrokes of Ming's painting and the movement of the crowd in ? Is the narrative in the paintings more hidden when the subtitle Scene of Crime suggests enigmatic clues? Is the Needle Woman the one who can sew new meanings at the Kunsthallen Brandts Klaedefabrik? Do the fabrics spread all over it make the Invisible Man more tangible, like the sacred Turin shroud? What does it mean to you to be surrounded by one entire, circular installation? While both Ming and the crowd of the megalopolis are looking at videotaped Sooja, is she looking at all? And what are you looking at? Could this show have an unplugged version? Will any narrative produced by anybody become the truth? Does the context of the show provide scope for eloquence? First published in the catalogue in conjunction with the exhibition SelfScape at Kunsthallen Brandts Klaedefabrik, Odense, Denmark, February 12, 2000 - February 25, 2000

Video stills from A Needle Woman. New Delhi, Tokyo, Shanghai, New York City.

SelfScape
Kim Sooja & Yan Pei-Ming

Kim Seung-Duk, 2000

Is there any duration in a painting?

Do videos become paintings when hung in a series on a wall, which you will pass without staying very long?

Does bringing Sooja's videos and Ming's landscape painting together turn them into spectacles?

When you project light over a painting hung in the dark, what does it bring you? Does it turn the exhibition room into a kind of a movie theater?

Do we try to challenge white with black? Darkness with light? Black box with white cube? Can we disintegrate the white cube just by erasing its walls?

How does Ming's black-and-white dark landscape, alongside the bright red self-portraits, collaborate with the hieratic back side of Sooja's figure in her videos?

When Sooja turns her back to the audience, does the absence of herself become a strong presence?

Is Ming looking at his self-portrait in the same way as Sooja is looking at the cityscape? Are you looking at Sooja in the same way she is looking at the cityscape? Is she looking at all? When is it your turn to look?

After having painted Mao as well as his own father, does Ming, in the new Autoportrait en pére in turn become a fatherly Chairman Mao?

Does Sooja, with her grey clothing and her famous braided long black hair, become the so-called mysterious oriental figure?

Is Ming's Paysage International more anonymous than Tokyo, Shanghai, New Delhi or New York as depicted in Sooja's videos?

Do you hear the quietness of the crowded cityscapes and the noise in the empty, deserted landscape?

Is there any correspondence between the movement of the brushstrokes of Ming's painting and the movement of the crowd in ?

Is the narrative in the paintings more hidden when the subtitle Scene of Crime suggests enigmatic clues?

Is the Needle Woman the one who can sew new meanings at the Kunsthallen Brandts Klaedefabrik?

Do the fabrics spread all over it make the Invisible Man more tangible, like the sacred Turin shroud?

What does it mean to you to be surrounded by one entire, circular installation?

While both Ming and the crowd of the megalopolis are looking at videotaped Sooja, is she looking at all?

And what are you looking at?

Could this show have an unplugged version?

Will any narrative produced by anybody become the truth?

Does the context of the show provide scope for eloquence?

First published in the catalogue in conjunction with the exhibition SelfScape at Kunsthallen Brandts Klaedefabrik, Odense, Denmark, February 12, 2000 - February 25, 2000

SelfScapeKim Sooja & Yan Pei-Ming

Kim Seung-Duk, 2000

SelfScape
Kim Sooja & Yan Pei-Ming