P21 is thrilled to announce our participation at West Bund Art & Design. As only a year old gallery, this is the gallery's first art fair participation. P21 is the youngest gallery among participating galleries at West Bund.
For our first participation at the fair, the gallery will present 5 different Korean artists ranging from established to emerging: Kim Tschang-Yeul, Choi Jeong Hwa, Meekyoung Shin, Sun Choi, Byungchan Lee.
Apart from the booth presentation (N312), also presenting are 2 large-scale installations by Choi Jeong Hwa: Fruit Tree and Flower Chandelier.
Widely recognized as one of the most influential figures in the establishment of contemporary art in Korea, Choi has been featured in major biennales including the Arsenale Kyiv (2012), the 17th Sydney Biennial (2010), the Gwangju Biennale (2006), the Venice Biennale - Korean pavilion (2005), the Liverpool Biennial (2004), the Lyon Biennale (2003), the Yokohama Triennale (2001), the São Paulo Biennale (1998) and the Taipei Biennale (1998).
He is currently holding a major solo exhibition at MMCA Seoul (the National Museum of Modern and Contemporary Art, Korea): 2018 Hyundai Motor Series.
[Flower Chandelier] 'Flowers' are a recurring subject in Choi's oeuvre. As he repeatedly tells the audience - 'You are Flowers' – Choi inspires us to discover and embrace our innate beauty ourselves as he would find the beauty and soul in every being in life. Arguably his most iconic series of works, Choi's giant inflatable flowers appeared in major exhibitions including Venice Biennale (2005), Liverpool Biennale (2003), inaugural exhibition of Mori Art Museum (2003), Sydney Biennale (2010), Flower Chandelier, Auckland Art Gallery Toi o Tāmaki, Auckland (2011), Mobile M+: Inflation, Hong Kong (2013), and Happy Together, Museum of Contemporary Art Kiasma, Helsinki (2016). The artificial flowers repeat blooming and withering by motors and become 'living' flowers that are more real than the real flowers as the artist would argue that the most artificial beings are today's most natural beings.
[Fruit Tree] Choi's works seem playful, yet they also make strong comments about rampant materialism, unchecked urbanization and the alienation from nature that results from this. The artist says "I feel strange when I see a real tree or flower. Nature as such is so rare these days that I'm actually afraid when I encounter it. Maybe all I can deal with is an idea of nature immune to destruction, so I make an artificial one to look at and enjoy." 'Fruit Tree' is an artificial cornucopia bountiful with fake, colorful fruits of disproportionate sizes bursting out of one tree. This inflatable sculpture directly comments on the dichotomous relationships of what is real and synthetic, natural and artificial, landscape and urban. This unnatural wonder appeared in exhibitions worldwide including Megacities Asia, MFA Boston (2016), Renaissance, Lille3000 (2015), Asia Corridor Contemporary Art Exhibition, Nijo Castle, Kyoto (2017), and Busan Biennale (2014).