Installation view of 《Moulage Mélancolique》 (Project Space Sarubia, 2019) ©Hannah Woo

Hannah Woo’s solo exhibition 《Moulage Mélancolique》 is being held at Project Space Sarubia.

Woo is an artist who employs her own intuitive sculptural language. Letting herself be released into and surrendering to an unknown world generates internal waves during the creative process and enables free imagination. Each sculptural language she employs is independently indecipherable. This nullifies the clarity of the world’s established languages and calls upon alternative imaginations, creating countless intimate visual lexicons. With such tendencies, Woo pauses along the unpredictable journey of time to carve out a moment of temporal emptiness that she alone can inhabit. On this imaginary stage, she unfolds the intersection where two selves, fraught with inner desires and conflicts, converge.

This is what constitutes 《Moulage Mélancolique》. To realize this, the artist creates an interior space titled duplex within the gallery and installs her own paintings, including Conductor’s View, an haute couture dress titled Moulage Mélancolique, and a large pendant mobile titled Bacchus along the external circulation route. Additionally, she transforms and utilizes various objects and drawings with her unique sensibility, constructing the entire space as a single creative language. She sets up partition walls to divide the space and situates duplex—a space reminiscent of the living room where she once played as a child, representing the “smooth, empty fake” at the center. duplex embodies her own desires, her inherent space, and provides the ultimate sanctuary. The objects and paintings surrounding this space, and the distant views from within, reveal the dissonance between hope and reality. This dissonance, in Woo’s belief, is replaced by the “abundant shabbiness of truth” and simultaneously reflects the utopia she aspires to achieve in reality.

Hannah Woo, duplex, 2019, MDF board, OSB board, eggshell paint, wainscoting molding, carpet, 240x322.1x526cm ©Hannah Woo

In previous exhibitions, the objects—characters masquerading as Woo’s various personae—played important roles. In this exhibition, however, these objects exist as background props rather than central characters, staging a theatrical scene where seemingly accidental “situations” are actually deliberately crafted. Woo exposes here the interaction and conflict between two selves that everyone experiences: opposing or communicating extremes of emotions and desires. This confrontation between the self results in conflicting expressions of self-contradiction and disjunction. These scenes, though complex and nuanced, emerge as an irreplaceable narrative where unfathomable tragedy and cheerfulness coexist—like two selves facing each other through a transparent window.

As an optimist, Woo dreams entirely of her own world. In an effort to approach an unattainable dream, she has collected and consumed countless objects. Through this process, she realizes what she truly desires and finds direction for her thoughts. The gap that arises through this cycle of collection and consumption may begin as purposeless, but for the artist, it becomes a crucial element in her creative practice. The tension within this gap forms the language and context of her art, guiding her along the path of creativity. Within this tension, her inner self continuously yearns for beauty and freedom.
 

Kwanhoon Lee｜Curator, Project Space Sarubia

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