작업 소개

57STUDIO는 2019년 서울문화재단 최초예술지원사업에 선정되어 자체 기획한 LENZ Magazine Project를 진행하였습니다. LENZ는 텍스트를 청각과 시각으로 확장하여 새로운 해석과 감각적 접근을 제안하는 Audio Visual Magazine입니다.

이 프로젝트는 텍스트를 선정하고 이를 다양한 방식으로 해석하며, 텍스트에서 시작되는 텍스처(Text-ure)를 탐구하는 과정으로 이루어졌습니다.

두 번째 텍스처는 SBS문화재단과 국립현대미술관이 공동 운영하는 <올해의 작가상>에서 2019 올해의 작가로 선정된 이주요 작가의 프로젝트 LOVE YOUR DEPOT 입니다.

이주요 작가는 전시장에 거대한 창고를 세우며, “전시 이후 작품들은 어디로 가는가?” 라는 질문을 던집니다.이에 대해 참여 작가들과 LOVE YOUR DEPOT 멤버들, 그리고 이주요 작가가 함께 대화를 나눕니다.

두번째 에피소드는 정지현 작가, 주요리와 함께 이번 전시에 대하여 좀 더 자세하게 이야기를 나눕니다. 주요리는 왜 국립현대미술관에 작품을 보관하는 창고를 만들었을까요?

57STUDIO was selected for the 2019 Seoul Foundation for Arts and Culture’s First Arts Support Project and carried out the LENZ Magazine Project. LENZ is an Audio-Visual Magazine that expands text into auditory and visual forms, proposing new interpretations and sensory approaches.

This project involved selecting texts and interpreting them in various ways, exploring the texture that emerges from these texts.

The second texture comes from LOVE YOUR DEPOT, a project by artist Jewyo Rhii, who was selected as the 2019 Artist of the Year by the SBS Cultural Foundation and the National Museum of Modern and Contemporary Art.

Jewyo Rhii constructs a massive warehouse in the exhibition space, posing the question: “After the show, where do the works go?” A conversation unfolds among participating artists, members of LOVE YOUR DEPOT, and Jewyo Rhii about this question.

The second episode features Jeong Ji-hyun and Jewyo Rhii, where they dive deeper into the details of the exhibition. They discuss why Jewyo Rhii decided to create a storage space for artworks at the National Museum of Modern and Contemporary Art.

MeeJee Lee: In a foreign country, editors of a magazine were discussing what kind of magazine to create. They came to two conclusions: First, they would focus on what they knew well. Second, they would focus on what they found interesting. Ultimately, rather than worrying about what others might think or what others might find interesting, they decided to focus on their own unique thoughts. Audio Visual Magazine, LENZ. This is the second episode. Now, let’s delve into the artist’s thoughts.

MeeJee Lee: The artist Jewyo Rhii is here with us. Please say hello.

Jewyo Rhii: Hello, I’m Jewyo Rhii.

MeeJee Lee: You need to say it louder, Jewyo.

Jewyo Rhii: I’m Jewyo Rhii, the artist. Let me say it again. I’m Jewyo Rhii, the artist.

MeeJee Lee: First of all, congratulations on being selected for the ‘Artist of the Year’ award.

Jewyo Rhii: Yes, thank you.

MeeJee Lee: We were there at the ceremony, remember? It was so exciting.

Jewyo Rhii: It seemed like you were the happiest. I was so surprised. You seemed so happy.

MeeJee Lee: This exhibition is recording the highest attendance among all ‘Artist of the Year’ exhibitions. Can you feel the attention from so many people?

Jewyo Rhii: Yes, I can feel it, and it’s a bit overwhelming.

MeeJee Lee: Have many people been talking about it?

Jewyo Rhii: Well, people in the art world have been giving me positive feedback. The thing that feels a bit unfamiliar is the media attention. There have been interviews and media requests, like radio interviews and such. But honestly, handling this level of attention… I’m not the kind of artist who’s used to this much spotlight.

MeeJee Lee: When we were working on LENZ and covering ‘Love Your Depot,’ I also participated with 57STUDIO. This broadcast was also prepared with the hope that the audience would understand the meaning of ‘Love Your Depot’ a bit more.

Jewyo Rhii: Yes, I’m really grateful. The setup here is amazing, and I’m feeling a little nervous.

MeeJee Lee: In Part 1, we briefly discussed with Ji-hyun about the storage of artworks after an exhibition. What about you, Jewyo? What do you do with your artworks after the exhibition ends?

Jewyo Rhii: I’ve struggled to understand the traditional aspects of art like sculpture or painting that were passed down from the late 90s. I couldn’t really grasp the spirit and technique behind them, and I didn’t want to practice towards that direction either. I’ve had a hard time understanding it all, and honestly, studying art itself was a challenge for me. Since then, I’ve just been collecting things. There’s always construction going on in Seoul, so I started gathering things and using whatever materials I could find. I didn’t think about sustainability, I just needed to get through the semester. That’s how my art formed. When I think about it now, I made a lot of things back then but had nowhere to place them. As a student, that was the case. So, in the back of my mind, I had this sense that I had to throw it away, and that kept me from investing too much effort into the pieces. I was more interested in temporary compositions and things that could be deconstructed easily. It became a habit. I couldn’t make anything solid, and it made it easier to throw things away without feeling guilty. I continued this process of discarding, and when it came to large exhibitions, I just brought materials that would fit with what I had already created, and when I went abroad, I’d collect interesting materials from there. Different countries use different materials, even the strings or plastic bags are different. So, I’d gather those things, then use them in my installation, and after the exhibition, I’d throw everything away. I never kept the materials because the shipping costs would be too high, especially with large exhibitions. It’s not even an option because the quantity of materials used is massive, like when you dismantle an entire shop. So, I’d throw things away without looking back. And that’s just how I’ve continued, throwing things away as I went. A lot has been discarded.

MeeJee Lee: So, the work, in a way, is fragile. But seeing that some of your works have traveled abroad, how do they manage to withstand all that?

Jewyo Rhii: Many times, they don’t hold up well. Some of them break. Honestly, when I was younger… I’ll admit, I relied a lot on insurance.

MeeJee Lee: You whispered that!

Jewyo Rhii: I mean, it wasn’t fraud or anything. (laughs)

Ji-hyun: Insurance fraud squad!

Jewyo Rhii: No, no, I didn’t commit fraud.

MeeJee Lee: Just to help our listeners understand, when artworks are exhibited, they are usually insured. If the artwork gets damaged or accidentally harmed, museums or galleries will compensate for or repair it. So, when exhibitions are held, the artworks are insured. But since Jewyo’s works are so fragile, they often get damaged, which led to relying on insurance.

Jewyo Rhii: For example, in places like China, back in the early 2000s, contemporary art was still in its infancy. China continued to embrace traditional art forms and recognized them as the essence of art. With the support of Kim Sun-jung and other curators from Japan Foundation and other countries, we were invited to Beijing. That was actually the first contemporary exhibition there.

MeeJee Lee: In the early 2000s.

Jewyo Rhii: I think it was in 2002. I went there, and while other artists’ works also got damaged, the issue for mine was customs. When passing through customs, they sliced through the boxes with a cutter, and my works were shredded. That was when I received a lot of… attention.

MeeJee Lee: Oh, congratulations!

Jeong Ji-hyun: What’s there to congratulate? It’s a bittersweet story. But, here, am I supposed to follow the script and say, “So, ’10 Years, Please’ is made up of these episodes,” or do I just go with the flow?

MeeJee Lee: I’m sorry, I put too much pressure on you.

Jeong Ji-hyun: No, I was about to jump in, but then the question kind of veered off.

Jewyo Rhii: Sorry, my mistake.

MeeJee Lee: It’s just that I was curious. I thought maybe our listeners wouldn’t understand the whole insurance thing, so I asked about it.

Jewyo Rhii: I just lived my younger years without much of a plan, just going along, and I thought, “Well, that’s just how it goes.” I really don’t know how I managed back then. Looking back now, it seems quite strange. I didn’t have any life insurance, to be honest. I never knew where I would be sleeping next year, or where I’d be around the same time the following year. That went on for about 20 years.

MeeJee Lee: It’s ironic, isn’t it? The gap between the insurance for your artwork and the insurance for your life is pretty wide.

Jewyo Rhii: Yeah, it seems like I didn’t have much of a plan. I think I felt so hopeless about making any plans at all. The more I thought about planning, the more I realized I couldn’t know anything for sure. So I just focused on the present, not looking too far ahead, which is why there were no plans.

Jeong Ji-hyun: Did you have any major insurance for your works at the National Museum of Modern Art this time?

Jewyo Rhii: Insurance? Well, if I were to claim it, it’d be a big problem… laughs

MeeJee Lee: Oh, so there is insurance then!

Jewyo Rhii: No, it’s just that here, if I get insurance, it’d be a disaster. It’s not for my artwork; it’s for other people’s works that are displayed here. So, I’m honestly a bit nervous about it.

MeeJee Lee: I see. I get it now. Based on what you said earlier, I remember one of your past works titled “10 Years, Please”. The idea behind that 10 years—wasn’t it a request for your fellow artists to hold onto their works for 10 years?

Jewyo Rhii: Yes, that’s correct. In 2006, I was in Europe again. From the late ’90s to the mid-2000s, I was traveling back and forth between Europe and Korea for exhibitions.

Jewyo Rhii: At that time, I was storing works of mine in various places, big and small, as part of exhibitions. I had been at the Rijksakademie, an artist residency in the Netherlands, for two years. By the time I finished in 2005, it was time to leave. I had to get everything out of my studio, and I knew I had to let go of a lot of things. I put everything into a cart, and a friend helped me. We went out to dispose of them, but the place was a former military base, so the structure was quite unusual. It was a closed, almost isolated area.

Jewyo Rhii: When you go to the second floor, there’s a thing called “the Ring.” It starts from one place, and you keep going around in the same direction. I kept circling around. It felt like some sort of ritual. At first, I thought the elevator on the other side was too small, so we decided to go to the other one, and then we just started spinning around, dragging things along. I filmed it, and after that, everything I had piled up, all these things from different places, were packed neatly onto carts. That itself became a form, and at one point, I thought, “Oh, it’s such a waste,” so I decided to leave it for two more days. I didn’t throw it away that night. Then, when I went home, I dreamt about it. I dreamt of the things being thrown away, and I ended up painting them. It was this weird, awkward ritual I was putting myself through.

But somehow, by chance, Kim Sun-jung came to visit from a business trip in Germany. She saw it and asked, “Why are you throwing this away?” I replied, “Well, it has nowhere to go, so it has to be thrown out.” She said, “Let’s hold onto it for a little while. Let’s see if we can send it to Seoul somehow.” That’s how it started. From there, it moved forward. Later on, at a place called “Samuso,” where Kim Sun-jung used to have an office in front of Seonjae Museum, they cleared the space to make room for it. That’s where my first solo exhibition in Seoul took place, and I just stacked everything there as it came to me.

MeeJee Lee: Oh, really? From there?

Jewyo Rhii: That’s where it all started. After that, I packed everything again and moved it. Then, I was invited by curator Kim Hyun-jin to do another exhibition. So, the condition for the exhibition was that I already had the works, so they asked, “Please store them for three months before the exhibition opens.” That was the exhibition condition – not, “Give me materials,” but rather, “Please store them for three months.”

MeeJee Lee: That’s interesting.

Jewyo Rhii: So, it was extended for another three months, and it went into a special exhibition at KIAF. Then, before I had to let go of everything, we decided to look at each form individually. Since curator Kim Hyun-jin is particularly sensitive to the form and substantial elements of art, she really wanted to see it. So I said, “Let’s do it.” That’s when we had the exhibition at Gallery 27, at the Kyeowon University.

MeeJee Lee: I saw that exhibition. Wow.

Jewyo Rhii: That’s a deep connection. I didn’t even know you saw it. What we did there was, we decided to delegate the works. Instead of throwing them away, I thought there might be people who would like them, so I invited everyone. I told the students to come, even the teachers. I said, “Take them.”

Jeong Ji-hyun: At that time, some people probably couldn’t resist the professor’s power and took them.

Jewyo Rhii: Exactly, exactly. All the professors were forced to take one each. And then, 10 years went by. People kept them for 10 years.

MeeJee Lee: So, that “Ten years, please” wasn’t just a label, it was the real 10 years, right?

Jewyo Rhii: That’s right. From 2006 to 2016.

MeeJee Lee: So, how did the end of those ‘Ten years, please’? How did the works fare?

Jewyo Rhii: In 2016, I collected everything. Since I made a promise, I called everyone. Some people disappeared, and some lost contact. But anyway, I gathered them. I gathered everything, and each piece had its own story. Curator Kim Hyun-jin suggested that it would be better to show the works in a different format, and I said, “You do it yourself…” I told her I couldn’t do it. She suggested a theater performance. I said, “I can’t do it, so you do it yourself.” And that’s when we met. Then, Director MeeJee Lee took the photos and filmed it.

MeeJee Lee: And truly, by chance, “10 years, please” was performed twice, once at the Mullae Arts Factory and then at the Namsan Arts Center. It took on the format of a performance, right?

Jewyo Rhii: Yes, it was a performance. Not really a performance format, because the objects couldn’t move. It was a bit ridiculous, so we figured out what to do. We created an apparatus for entrances and exits, appearing and disappearing, using movements for the works. The performers moved, not the actors, and we choreographed it. It was fun.

MeeJee Lee: It was fun.