Multi-Media Artist Jeon Questions Hyper Reality
By Cathy Rose A. Garcia
Staff Reporter
As you walk inside the dimly lit room, you'll notice the walls are covered in mismatched wood planks, which makes you wonder if you're really inside the Arario Gallery, Cheonan, Chungcheong Province. On one side, a digital animation clip showing a group of North Korean defectors' futile attempts to climb over a wall plays in a continuous loop. Another wall shows a digital animation clip of a woman sobbing after evidently being raped.
On the floor, you'll find a 100 won North Korean banknote lit from behind. At first glance, it seems like an ordinary bill featuring Kim Il-sung's childhood home, and his shadowy image in the background. Crouch down to carefully look at the digital animation, showing a tiny figure entering the house over and over.
In the next room, another digital animation video is projected on the wall, showing toy soldiers whirling around in circles as a waltz plays in the background.
Welcome to Korean artist Jeon Joon-ho's world of ``Hyper Realism.'' In his solo exhibition at Arario Gallery, the multi-media artist tackles the reality of Korean society and politics, with a touch of irony and dark humor. The exhibition features nine video series, three installations and one painting, as Jeon recreates a ``hyper real'' world in the gallery.
Hyperreality is a term used in postmodernism that describes the inability to distinguish reality from fantasy. Jeon uses his art to criticize the distorted reality that mass media feeds society. He also tackles the complex relations between the United States, North Korea and South Korea.
The division of North and South Korea is one of the themes of Jeon's work. ``Hyper Realism (State of Brother),'' which shows plastic soldiers dancing endlessly, is inspired by the film ``Tae-geuk-gi'' about two brothers torn apart by the Korean War. It is as if the toy soldiers are trying to embrace each other, but their attempts are futile, as they never end up embracing.
Another work shows the image of General Douglas McArthur. ``It seems as if the General ceaselessly repeats his cry, `I shall return,' which reminds us of the capitalism's repeated conquest. This work ironically describes the reality, in which Koreans are becoming more indifferent to the tragedies caused by the division of Korea and more fascinated by the pompous images of capitalism, commodities, and popular media,'' Arario Gallery said.
Jeon makes use of an American icon, the football player in ``Player 13.'' It is a bronze statue of an African-American football player, which has an engine, instead of a heart. Ironically, the phrase: ``his passionate heart will be enshrined forever'' is engraved on the statue's base.
Jeon's works hope to make people question the ``reality'' that is being fed by the mass media. ``We are living in a modern society that does not accept the reality as it is. The images of reality communicated through mass media are far from the realities in which we live. The boundaries between the reality and the unreality are broken down, and information and images are flooding over. This implies that our recognition of reality needs to be taken to another level so that we may correctly understand them. In this sense, the 'hyper reality' by Jeon will encourage us to seriously question and examine the realities,'' Arario Gallery said.
Jeon made his New York City debut with an exhibition at the Perry Rubenstein Gallery last year. ``The White House,'' a video work featuring a $20 bill with a tiny figure painting out the building, attracted much attention. The New York Times described Jeon's work as ``powerful, thought-provoking art.''
He won the Grand Prix at the 27th Biennial of Graphic Art in Ljubljana, Slovenia last year, and the 2004 Biennale Prize at the Gwangju Biennale. He has participated in several group exhibitions in London, Shanghai, Beijing, Tokyo, Singapore, Stuttgart, Taipei and Santiago.
The exhibition runs through March 9. Admission is 3,000 won. Visit www.arariogallery.com or call (041) 551-5100.