World Wonderland and The Death of Difference 2009
Shin Hyun Jung
There are many ways in a life in which to make sense of the world. The uncertainties of life drive everyone in different directions to be sure and some to extremes. History can be read as an obituary rich with the details of men and women who made their ‘little mark’. I say ‘little mark’, because as interesting as these stories may be we are left with only the residual trace of real lives, facts emptied of dreams, passion and emotion. We are left to scan the biased jottings of writers and witnesses who often had little conscience for accuracy or truth instead reporting conjecture and hearsay. The often-fragmented reports of famous and lesser mortals reveal lives lived either extraordinarily or in obscurity, with great passion or dogged survival, in opulent splendour or wretched poverty.
The history of human society has been characterised by the mostly unheard stories of the countless mass of souls that have come and gone like waves on the shore. These voices form that great echo of unfulfilled longing and stillborn dreams that should have built a different tomorrow. This is the sound that buffets the souls of men sensitive enough to hear the sad refrain. The business of building a life or fulfilling a dream is the challenge for all but the task of going beyond the ordinary is the reserve of the courageous few. Korean artist Shin Hyun Jung is one of these exemplars.
Shin has been traversing the globe in his restless hunt for meaning. He has been perusing the essence of cultures wider and more diverse to his own. Relentlessly he tracks down the unusual and consumes it with vigour even as a gourmand would upon discovering a strange new culinary delicacy. There is a reason behind his methodology. Brave souls have been blazing paths in similar fashion for eons setting out on what were often ill -fated voyages of discovery. Often the motivation was commercial but for some it was the unknown that drew them away from the familiar and safe. Shin regards the world as his domain, his laboratory and feels comfortable enough in it. In his pursuit of experience he broadens his sense of what the world is. Effectively he pulls together the collective experiences of ancient cultures and filters them through his creative sensibility in order to make something new. His objects are imbued with universality at once recognisable and yet mysterious. The viewer is left to imagine and puzzle out the meaning of what is seen.
The world is turning on its head with the rush towards a brave new world and the embrace of technology that is revolutionizing human societies everywhere. The local is being globalized and cultures consumed or cannibalised as world finance threatens to homogenize everything. Difference is the victim as cultural values are fused and diffused by rapid transport systems and commodity markets. Capital and fashion threaten the very notion of individuality, heterogeneity or singularity. In the rush for profits global corporations have set about marketing culture as fashionable commodity. The death of difference is taking place and world cultural diversity is the victim. It appears there is no limit to what is possible and drunk with the dream of even more fabulous profits the markets set about murderously to kill off and dispose of the body once and for all.
Shin comes as a knight in shining armour attempting to save or resurrect that, which is under threat or dying. Again and again he attempts to breathe new life into the objects of his affection. Whether nature or culture he brings together his skill and judgement in order to redress the grievous damage inflicted by the forces of progress. Even though his Universalist stance is somewhat synonymous with homogenizing market forces his optimism dares to retrieve and monumentalize his subjects. He sets about this task by making sometimes repeat reconnaissance trips to his intended destinations whether it be Africa, South America, China or the Middle East. Moving through the landscape he draws in as if by osmosis the socio-cultural residue of people and place and then through internal filtration he creates works imbued with a sense of artefact. These works contain the trace of what is about to disappear.
Art is a singular force with the power to capture and hold the vestiges of memory and the force of ideas. Artists the world over are dealing with the primitive urge to differentiate between the seen and unseen, to locate meaning in and through personal expression and purpose in the act of making. Difference is the seen characteristic of things with the power to attract or repel. It is the substance of creation whereby the new can be made manifest ushering in a new order. We both celebrate and curse change but are captive to its inevitability. When the new comes we are able to see the old with new eyes. In a sense the new contextualizes the old historically, ideologically and culturally. This difference is continually under review. It is the active agent that prevents the homogenization of everything yet conversely threatens the death of diversity. At the present time technology holds the power to effectively annihilate cultural diversity with its absorption and subsequent re -mixing of diverse cultural identities. Everything is grist for the mill as multi media conglomerates search for the “new”. Nothing is spared in the endless search for the next big thing. Technology drives change relentlessly and the world is filling up with hybrids. Popular culture is the new difference subsuming all authentic cultures before it.
Shin has been paying homage to the authentic from the beginning of his practice. He revisits history in order to make sense of where we are now. His work is an attempt to preserve what was different to our modern experience. When Shin visited the ancient site of Babylon many years ago he was deeply inspired and this influence can be seen in much of his subsequent work. In a sense his art is an attempt to immortalize what “was”, the difference to what “is”. Shin desires to experience what “is” before it fades away. Cultures are disappearing as urban life consumes minority groups and strips away their historical identities. This has always occurred but with globalization we see the speed accelerate dramatically. There are fronts of resistance to be sure but the power of world markets and the lure of wealth are breaking down the collective will of many. Shins’ work attempts to show the essence of what was, to provoke the imagination of the viewer with visions of both natural and man-made worlds. We can sense his nostalgia for what is lost and his attempt to restore it. Through Shins’ work we look back in order to look forward. We mourn what is lost but remember it in order to navigate the “new” difference intelligently.
William Boot
Shin Hyun Jung
There are many ways in a life in which to make sense of the world. The uncertainties of life drive everyone in different directions to be sure and some to extremes. History can be read as an obituary rich with the details of men and women who made their ‘little mark’. I say ‘little mark’, because as interesting as these stories may be we are left with only the residual trace of real lives, facts emptied of dreams, passion and emotion. We are left to scan the biased jottings of writers and witnesses who often had little conscience for accuracy or truth instead reporting conjecture and hearsay. The often-fragmented reports of famous and lesser mortals reveal lives lived either extraordinarily or in obscurity, with great passion or dogged survival, in opulent splendour or wretched poverty.
The history of human society has been characterised by the mostly unheard stories of the countless mass of souls that have come and gone like waves on the shore. These voices form that great echo of unfulfilled longing and stillborn dreams that should have built a different tomorrow. This is the sound that buffets the souls of men sensitive enough to hear the sad refrain. The business of building a life or fulfilling a dream is the challenge for all but the task of going beyond the ordinary is the reserve of the courageous few. Korean artist Shin Hyun Jung is one of these exemplars.
Shin has been traversing the globe in his restless hunt for meaning. He has been perusing the essence of cultures wider and more diverse to his own. Relentlessly he tracks down the unusual and consumes it with vigour even as a gourmand would upon discovering a strange new culinary delicacy. There is a reason behind his methodology. Brave souls have been blazing paths in similar fashion for eons setting out on what were often ill -fated voyages of discovery. Often the motivation was commercial but for some it was the unknown that drew them away from the familiar and safe. Shin regards the world as his domain, his laboratory and feels comfortable enough in it. In his pursuit of experience he broadens his sense of what the world is. Effectively he pulls together the collective experiences of ancient cultures and filters them through his creative sensibility in order to make something new. His objects are imbued with universality at once recognisable and yet mysterious. The viewer is left to imagine and puzzle out the meaning of what is seen.
The world is turning on its head with the rush towards a brave new world and the embrace of technology that is revolutionizing human societies everywhere. The local is being globalized and cultures consumed or cannibalised as world finance threatens to homogenize everything. Difference is the victim as cultural values are fused and diffused by rapid transport systems and commodity markets. Capital and fashion threaten the very notion of individuality, heterogeneity or singularity. In the rush for profits global corporations have set about marketing culture as fashionable commodity. The death of difference is taking place and world cultural diversity is the victim. It appears there is no limit to what is possible and drunk with the dream of even more fabulous profits the markets set about murderously to kill off and dispose of the body once and for all.
Shin comes as a knight in shining armour attempting to save or resurrect that, which is under threat or dying. Again and again he attempts to breathe new life into the objects of his affection. Whether nature or culture he brings together his skill and judgement in order to redress the grievous damage inflicted by the forces of progress. Even though his Universalist stance is somewhat synonymous with homogenizing market forces his optimism dares to retrieve and monumentalize his subjects. He sets about this task by making sometimes repeat reconnaissance trips to his intended destinations whether it be Africa, South America, China or the Middle East. Moving through the landscape he draws in as if by osmosis the socio-cultural residue of people and place and then through internal filtration he creates works imbued with a sense of artefact. These works contain the trace of what is about to disappear.
Art is a singular force with the power to capture and hold the vestiges of memory and the force of ideas. Artists the world over are dealing with the primitive urge to differentiate between the seen and unseen, to locate meaning in and through personal expression and purpose in the act of making. Difference is the seen characteristic of things with the power to attract or repel. It is the substance of creation whereby the new can be made manifest ushering in a new order. We both celebrate and curse change but are captive to its inevitability. When the new comes we are able to see the old with new eyes. In a sense the new contextualizes the old historically, ideologically and culturally. This difference is continually under review. It is the active agent that prevents the homogenization of everything yet conversely threatens the death of diversity. At the present time technology holds the power to effectively annihilate cultural diversity with its absorption and subsequent re -mixing of diverse cultural identities. Everything is grist for the mill as multi media conglomerates search for the “new”. Nothing is spared in the endless search for the next big thing. Technology drives change relentlessly and the world is filling up with hybrids. Popular culture is the new difference subsuming all authentic cultures before it.
Shin has been paying homage to the authentic from the beginning of his practice. He revisits history in order to make sense of where we are now. His work is an attempt to preserve what was different to our modern experience. When Shin visited the ancient site of Babylon many years ago he was deeply inspired and this influence can be seen in much of his subsequent work. In a sense his art is an attempt to immortalize what “was”, the difference to what “is”. Shin desires to experience what “is” before it fades away. Cultures are disappearing as urban life consumes minority groups and strips away their historical identities. This has always occurred but with globalization we see the speed accelerate dramatically. There are fronts of resistance to be sure but the power of world markets and the lure of wealth are breaking down the collective will of many. Shins’ work attempts to show the essence of what was, to provoke the imagination of the viewer with visions of both natural and man-made worlds. We can sense his nostalgia for what is lost and his attempt to restore it. Through Shins’ work we look back in order to look forward. We mourn what is lost but remember it in order to navigate the “new” difference intelligently.
William Boot