Yanghee Lee's inaugural work for 2024, titled IN, presented at Whistle gallery, is a performance art piece that delves into the notions of commencement, repetition, and the culmination of time. The artist tightens the perceived distance between the performing body, the observing audience, generating coherent processes within the space.
The dancer's body embraces time through movement, condensing past, present, and future¹. The dancer envisions the future by creating and training forms. Hours of past time spent composing and practicing these forms accumulate and flow into the present, forming a cohesive and enduring presence. Lee's statement 'I would like to perform as much as my finite body's condition allows', reflects the artist's determination to exist through the artwork itself, using her body as the material.
Extended periods of sustaining form are frequently demonstrated in the performance of a highly trained dancer². This phenomenon occurs when the dancer's body aligns with the off-beat before music, creating moments that linger in the air. Such instances, reminiscent of fleeting pauses, are in sync with the audience's sensory experience. During these moments, the body diverges from rhythm, asserting control of space-time.
IN spans five days in a state of Varsa and is divided into two parts: the first, performed solitude, and the second, presented to the public for approximately 80 minutes each day starting from 4:30pm. The artist introduces her seven practices, namely Center in Center, Edge, Hail, Palm, Trembling, Wall, and 100. Various improvisations such as spontaneous choices, adjustments, reflections, and repetitions take place while physically engaging in the space. To focus on primal forms and states in performance art, the artist minimises traditional theatrical elements—lighting, costumes, props, stage—revealing the neutrality of the gallery space.
Yanghee Lee's performance in the white cube underlines the artist's aim to secure extreme temporal experiences in a transformative mode, realising her performance directly as an artwork. The subtle variations in breathing from both the artist and the audience merge into a harmonious rhythm, synchronising with her movements and inhalation.
1 Quote from the artist
2 Quote from the artist, 'Flesh Stone Oil' (2022). Sohwansa, Suzy Park.
Press release courtesy Whistle.
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