Yong Joo Kim : Reconfiguring the Ordinary
upcoming exhibition :
*Reconfiguring the Ordinary II (Nov 22- Dec 1, 2011 )
Hangaram Design Museum of Seoul Arts center, Seoul, Korea
After reading the past two posts on competition and plastic surgery, some people asked me how those subjects relate to my work. So today, I wanted to share more of the story behind my work.
I was born and raised in Seoul, the metropolitan capital of Korea, teeming with a population of over ten million. While Seoul is a beautiful city on the surface, what lies beneath is the seldom talked about presence of the cutthroat competition that permeates the culture.
Immersed in competition, I was taught that recognition was the ultimate goal. My peers believed that scoring high on exams, and entering high-ranked universities were the only ways to gain recognition. For my female colleagues and I, competition didn’t end in academics. While I was too afraid of going under the knife, ten of my friends eventually went on to receive plastic surgery. They believed firmly that beauty affords greater probability of getting a good job or finding a successful husband: both effective ways to gain recognition.
A similar desire to achieve beauty was the goal of my undergraduate artwork. I started each project with a clear vision of what each piece should look like. I then judged and valued my work based on how closely my production matched the design. I spent a long time filing, sanding, and polishing precious metals. I did not enjoy this process, but I felt that it was a small price to pay to achieve the beauty that I so desired.
All this changed when I moved to Providence for graduate work. Living in a different city came as a shock. I was completely alone, and it was hard to meet people. The culture shock, the language barrier, and the workload all made it very difficult for me to feel at home.
I then realized that without the cultural restrictions of home, I am able to explore my environments more freely. I didn’t know what the social norm was so I wasn’t pressured by it. With nobody to stare at, and nobody to be stared by, I started to dress down. Day by day, I felt the longing for beauty start to dissolve. In its place was now a new desire: a desire to explore the new environment, to understand, internalize, and to empathize.
Through this process of exploration, I realized that the world is full of unnoticed objects. I found such overlooked objects beautiful. As I began to recognize their full potential, I was compelled to collect them.
I became interested in taking these mundane objects and evolving them into something new. Instead of my usual repertoire of precious metals, my choice of materials now came from the corners of our everyday lives. By assembling, grouping, clustering, and piling these small and simple elements, I learned that beauty could emerge from an unexpected source.
As the wearer approaches my work, I hope their perspective shifts and the sudden and unexpected realizations spark wonder, discovery, tension, joy, and play. This approach challenges the traditional and cultural notions of value in jewelry, which focuses on expensive metals and stones that emphasize the wealth of the wearer. I am looking forward to introducing unconventional use of familiar artifacts into a world full of conventions. » (july 2011)
Yong Joo Kim- Reconfiguring the Ordinary: Rounded, Aligned and Twisted #1, neckpiece – Velcro, thread
« Think of beans, straws, pins, nails, velcro, snaps, cable ties, and electric caps. These objects are not normally considered beautiful or valuable. I explore the value of such mundane objects, and discover their hidden beauty through a process of reconfiguration. Think of the velcro: a long strip of rough, bland, and industrial object, seen on shoes, bags, watches, and at the grocery store. As I pay close attention to it and its system of organization in my environment, I find new ways of looking, new ways of decomposing and composing them, and new ways of creating a relationship between it and our body. My work introduces unconventional use of familiar artifacts into a world full of conventions.
By assembling, grouping, clustering, and piling, the simple elements become complex, and give rise to the unexpected. As the wearer approaches my work, their perspective shifts and sudden realizations spark wonder, discovery, tension, joy and play. My investigation of creation, innovation, and transformation questions the definition of value, and provides a never-ending field for invention «
Yong Joo Kim-velcro necklace
Yong Joo Kim– 2010
« This spring 2010 work is an extension of my previous body of work, Reconfiguring the Ordinary. After graduation, I was left with a limited set of tools and equipments at my home studio. Given the limitations, I focused on a single material, Velcro, which can be freely cut, attached, stacked, piled, rolled, bent and sewn together with my own bare hands or by using simple hand tools. With the material at hand, I began to explore a wide variety of possibilities in form. Given the physical properties afforded by Velcro, I was also able to experiment with the fabrication of unusually large pieces as well. » Yong Joo Kim
Yong Joo Kim– 2010
Yong Joo Kim– 2010
Yong Joo Kim– 2010
Yong Joo Kim– 2010
Yong Joo Kim- RISD graduate show embraces the new austerity – 2009 – « The pieces in Yong Joo Kim’s « Reconfiguring the Ordinary » collection are made from an unlikely mix of Velcro, zip ties and dried beans. »
Yong Joo Kim- 2008
