K-ART FOCUS For Dew Kim, K-pop, faith and queer bodies meet onstage

By Lee Hae-rin

• Published Oct 2, 2026 12:00 PM KST

Artist uses fragmented sculptures, K-pop symbols and religious imagery to examine visibility, desire and violence

JEONNAM-GWANGJU SPECIAL METROPOLITAN CITY — A pink microphone, a K-pop light stick and a glowing circular light each crown three white, soft-edged bodies that may be either collapsing into or growing out of the floor, entangled in chains and pierced by spindly metal structures with smartphone screens.

The figure in Dew Kim’s “Legion, Nowhere Whole” (2026) evokes images of wounded idols, saints and soldiers. One form resembles a horse, another suggests a person or an animal caught in a moment of metamorphosis. Together, they form Kim’s response to a world in which people are continually asked to put themselves on display through social media, performance and the pursuit of recognition.

“The title was inspired by Roman legions and soldiers,” Kim said in an interview with The Korea Times. “They were expected to fight until their bodies were no longer intact. I thought that was similar to how we are constantly required to show ourselves, to be recognized and validated, until there is almost no part of the body left whole.”

The work is part of “The Look is A Li(k)e” at the Italian Pavilion at Donggok Museum in Jeonnam-Gwangju Special Metropolitan City. The exhibition considers the “look” as both a digital “like” and a socially constructed “lie,” examining how appearance shapes recognition, belonging and power.

For Kim, who works across sculpture, video and performance, the installation reflects a newer form of self-exposure: the ability — and pressure — to place oneself before an audience.

“I use social media a lot — almost to the level of addiction,” Kim said. “On social media, anyone can put themselves on an altar."

In the artist’s view, social media has turned attention into a powerful form of capital. A “like” can help build a career, expand a community or turn an individual into a brand. However, that visibility comes with a cost.

“It’s a platform where desire and capitalism work together very efficiently,” Kim said. “You have to sacrifice yourself, show yourself and, in a way, inflict violence on yourself to keep drawing people’s attention.”

Kim does not view social media as purely negative. Digital platforms have also widened access to public visibility, enabling people historically excluded from mainstream media — including members of queer communities — to build audiences and connect with others on their own terms. Kim cited Pungja, a Korean transgender entertainer who first built a large audience on YouTube before expanding into mainstream television, as an example of that broader access.

However, Kim is equally interested in the instability of public attention. A performer, leader or religious figure placed onstage may appear powerful, he said, but the audience holds a more volatile form of authority: the power to raise, replace or bring down the person it once celebrated.

This tension — between elevation and exposure, devotion and punishment — has become central to Kim’s recent works. His practice brings together K-pop, religion and queer performance as contexts that appear unrelated; however, each of them places bodies before an audience, whether as a part of a ritual or system of desire.

A lifelong K-pop fan, Kim said the music has had “a spiritual presence” since childhood. “I was born male, but from when I was young, I dreamed of becoming a girl group member,” Kim said. “Not the center, but perhaps a supporting vocalist.”

That personal attachment developed alongside a religious upbringing. His father is a pastor and Kim wrote in his 2021 publication “When the Water Blushed” that he “had to compete with God for my father’s attention,” and that the bible stories that filled his childhood — tales of sacrifice, slavery, imprisonment and torture — “seemed more exciting to me than the fairy tales.”

After earning Bachelor's degree in metal craft from Konkuk University and Master's degree in sculpture from the Royal College of Art in London, Kim developed HornyHoneydew, a fictional queer shaman-idol persona as a counterfigure to the Christianity’s rejection of queer people. His studies in the United Kingdom and travels in South America further drew the artist toward shamanism, animism and other spiritual traditions that have survived outside European religious frameworks.

“Religion can be very queer,” Kim said. “It is a point outside of everyday life, outside of normality. Spiritual things, queer things and artistic things all have that in common.”

Over time, Kim came to see that the bodies central to K-pop, religion and queer performance have a common point of overlap: they are placed on a stage, altar or platform, and made to carry out rituals for spectatorship, desire and power. An idol performs before fans; a martyr is elevated for worship; and a shaman mediates collective emotions. In different ways, each stages a body to be seen by others.

“They all shine, but the power they have can always be overturned,” Kim said.

This fall, Kim is expanding that inquiry at the Busan Biennale. His installations include a stage with a precariously balanced microphone resembling a cross, blood-red fabric and tangled bodies hidden under latex. Light sticks, crowd sounds and a bridge-like passage bring visitors through an environment shaped by devotion and collective desire.

“Humanity has always sought to place certain individuals on the stage,” Kim said. “Stepping onto the stage grants one power, yet ultimately, one is left with a body that remains utterly vulnerable.”

“The Look is A Li(k)e” runs through Feb. 14, 2027, at Donggok Museum in Jeonnam-Gwangju Special Metropolitan City.