Artist of the day: Artist of the Day, September 25, 2024: Lee Bul, a South Korean sculptor, installation artist, media artist (#2120)

Lee Bul (1964), a South Korean artis who lives and works in Seoul, South Korea, works across a diverse range of media—from drawing, sculpture, and painting to performance, installation, and video—to examine the intricacies of shared human consciousness and the myths and folklore that accompany history. She investigates the liminal space between binaries such as the individual and the collective, and contradictory feelings such as isolation and claustrophobia. Her installations and sculptures explore universal themes including the utopian desire to achieve perfection through technological advances and the dystopic suspicions and failures that often result. Though varied in material and content, the works are united in their exploration of structural systems—from the individual body to larger architectural frameworks that encompass cities and utopian societies. For Lee Bul, humankind’s fascination with technology ultimately refers to our preoccupations with the human body and our desire to transcend flesh in pursuit of immortality. This interest often materializes in her work in the form of a cyborg—a being that is both organic and machine—the closest thing to a human that truly achieves this ideal. Lee Bul considers the cyborg a conceptual metaphor in its personification of social attitudes to technology; simultaneously a paragon and a monster.

Lee Bul received a B.F.A. in sculpture from Hongik University, Seoul, in 1987.

Her work is in numerous international public and private collections, including the Amore Pacific Museum of Art, Seoul, South Korea; Artsonje Center, Seoul, South Korea; Bernard Arnault Collection, Paris, France British Museum, London, United Kingdom; Daegu Museum of Art, Daegu, South Korea; Fukuoka Asian Art Museum, Fukuoka, Japan; Govett-Brewster Art Gallery, New Plymouth, New Zealand; Leeum, Samsung Museum of Art, Seoul, South Korea; Los Angeles County Museum of Art (LACMA), Los Angeles, CA; M+, Hong Kong, Hong Kong; Mori Art Museum, Tokyo, Japan; Musee d’Art Moderne Grand-Duc Jean, Luxembourg; Museum of Fine Arts, Houston, TX; National Gallery of Victoria, Melbourne, Australia; National Gallery of Canada, Ottawa, Canada; National Museum of Modern and Contemporary Art, Seoul, South Korea; Seoul Museum of Art, Seoul, South Korea; The Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, New York, NY; Tate Modern, London, United Kingdom; Queensland Art Gallery, Brisbane, Australia; and the Walker Art Center, Minneapolis, MN.

In 2019, Lee Bul received the Ho-Am Prize for The Arts, which is awarded to people of Korean heritage who have contributed to the enrichment of culture and arts for humankind. In 2014, she received the Noon Award at the 10th Gwangju Biennale, given to an established artist who has produced the most experimental work that embodies the theme of the biennale. In 1999, Lee Bul was awarded an honorable mention at the 48th Venice Biennale for her contribution to both the Korean Pavilion and the international exhibition curated by Harald Szeemann.

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