Lee Donggi, Citizen of the World, 2014 © Lee Donggi

Gallery Hyundai presents the solo exhibition 《Zero Gravity》 by Lee Donggi (b. 1967), an artist who has consistently explored fragmented images within the context of mass media society since the 1990s.
 
The exhibition title “Zero Gravity” reveals the artist’s long-standing inquiry—one that has persisted from the early stages of his practice to the present—into what he defines as “images of today.” Although widely known as the “father of Atomaus” or a “pioneer of Korean Pop Art,” Lee Donggi’s body of work cannot be fully encompassed by the terms “Atomaus” or “Pop Art” alone.

For Lee Donggi, “images of today” are not bound by a single, dominant force such as gravity; rather, they float freely, collide, disperse, and emerge unpredictably. In other words, the contemporary condition of images—having lost a singular referent and now suspended in midair—along with their random selection and recombination within an unstable and indeterminate network of meanings, constitutes the underlying logic that runs throughout his practice.

Ultimately, this exhibition seeks to illuminate the state of “anomie of contemporary images” that the artist has continuously explored, from before Atomaus to after Atomaus.
 
In this way, the images proposed by Lee Donggi resist singular definition; they are inherently complex and disordered. Paradoxically, through his work, the artist invites viewers to reflect on the possibility of a balance that does not lean toward any one side.

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