Kwang-Young Chun: The Soul—Journey to America
December 14, 2008, to May 24, 2009
Curator: Richard Klein
Exhibition Reception December 14, 2008; 3 to 5 pm
The Aldrich Contemporary Art Museum is pleased to announce that noted Korean artist Kwang-Young Chun has created his largest free-standing paper sculpture to date—just over 14 feet and approximately 650 pounds— expressly for presentation in the Museum’s two story Project Space for his exhibition The Soul—Journey to America.
Kwang-Young Chun makes intricate sculpture out of the recycled pages of old Korean books and medicine wrappers printed on mulberry paper. He wraps the handmade paper—inscribed with Korean characters— around thousands of Styrofoam tetrahedrons and other geometric forms that serve as the basic units of his compositions. The forms are then arranged in free-standing three-dimensional sculptures or mounted on the wall as two-dimensional low-reliefs. The new sculpture, which belongs to his Aggregation series, will be installed in the center of the gallery, offering visitors a holistic three-hundred-and-sixty-degree view of the piece, as well as a spectacular bird’s eye vantage from the Project Space balcony.
Curator Richard Klein says, “Chun has been influential to a younger generation of artists and successful in projecting traditional concerns to a broader, more international audience.” Klein continues, “Words become buried in Chun’s forms so that the work resembles organic forms that often grow up from the ground. These crystallized boulders and monumental pods with irregular surfaces reference the natural landscape, which is deeply imbedded in Korean art history, but are created from man-made modules made from both vintage and modern materials.”
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Kwang-Young Chun: The Soul—Journey to America
Kwang-Young Chun, Aggregation 08-AU022/ (installation view at The Aldrich Contemporary Art Museum, Ridgefield), 2008
Courtesy of the artist
Kwang-Young Chun is represented by Robert Miller Gallery, New York
The Museum wishes to thank Kim Foster Gallery, New York, and Michelle Rosenfeld Gallery, New York, for their help in realizing this work
Kwang-Young Chun: The Soul—Journey to America
Kwang-Young Chun, Aggregation 08-AU022/ (installation view at The Aldrich Contemporary Art Museum, Ridgefield), 2008
Courtesy of the artist
Kwang-Young Chun is represented by Robert Miller Gallery, New York
The Museum wishes to thank Kim Foster Gallery, New York, and Michelle Rosenfeld Gallery, New York, for their help in realizing this work
Kwang-Young Chun: The Soul—Journey to America
Kwang-Young Chun, Aggregation 08-AU022/ (installation view at The Aldrich Contemporary Art Museum, Ridgefield), 2008
Courtesy of the artist
Kwang-Young Chun is represented by Robert Miller Gallery, New York
The Museum wishes to thank Kim Foster Gallery, New York, and Michelle Rosenfeld Gallery, New York, for their help in realizing this work
The Artist:
Kwang-Young Chun was born in 1944 in Hongchun, Korea. He received his BFA from Hong-Ik University,
Seoul, and his MFA from the Philadelphia College of Art. He was named Artist of the Year in 2001 by the
National Museum of Contemporary Art, Korea, and he has exhibited widely in Korea and Japan.
The Soul—Journey to America will travel to the University of Wyoming Art Museum following its Aldrich debut.
Special thanks to SK Telecom for funding the transport of Kwang-Young Chun’s sculpture from Korea to America.
Kwang-Young Chun is represented by Robert Miller Gallery, New York. The Museum wishes to thank Kim Foster Gallery, New York, and Michelle Rosenfeld Gallery, New York, for their help in the realization of this work.
Aldrich exhibitions are supported, in part, by the Connecticut Commission on Culture & Tourism and the National Endowment for the Arts.
Image: Kwang-Young Chun, Aggregation 08-AU022/ (installation view at The Aldrich Contemporary Art Museum, Ridgefield), 2008
