Haegue Yang rearranges everyday objects, such as blinds, electrical fans, lights and racks, into fragile sculptural arrangements. Balancing poetics and politics, her installations reflect a sense of precarity, particularly in relation to the subjects of migration, displacement, social class, labour and gender inequality — all factors in the processes of minoritisation.

The work Swedish Villa, made of yellow and blue Venetian blinds, references the Swedish flag. The arrangement is neither open nor closed, alluding simultaneously to both inside and outside, to the private and the public. The use of blinds in many of Yang’s installations references what the artist describes as ‘communities of absence’ — those that sit on the periphery, hidden from mainstream society. The title Swedish Villa also tells us something about the banal aspirations perpetuated by national cultures. The work is presented at Göteborgs konsthall.

Series of Vulnerable Arrangements – Version Seoul is an early formative installation by Yang, typically combining elements that are ‘hard’ and ‘soft’. The objects engage in a coexistence of mutual dependency. The installation consists of seven IV drip stands, which are animated with coloured lights, cords and a fan, arranged sculpturally and spatially in a way that provides them with a frail anthropomorphic quality. The humble life of these ‘vulnerable arrangements’ can be seen as a metaphor for the fragility of coexistence in today’s society.

The work Series of Vulnerable Arrangements – Version Seoul has been reproduced for GIBCA 2017 and is presented at Röda Sten Konsthall .

Haegue Yang lives and works in Berlin and Seoul.

Supported by Institut für Auslandsbeziehungen (ifa)

Photo
Swedish Villa, installation view WheredoIendandyoubeing- On Secularity, Göteborg International Biennial for Contemporary Art 2017, Göteborgs Konsthall and Röda Sten Konsthall. Photo Hendrik Zeitler.