© Kang Seung Lee

One and J. Gallery will present Kang Seung Lee’s solo exhibition, 《Garden》, opening on Thursday, November 22. In this exhibition, Kang Seung Lee will showcase drawings, installations, and video works that honor and document the lives of Derek Jarman (1942–1994) and Oh Joonsoo (1964–1998), two individuals who actively fought for gay rights in the UK and Korea, respectively, before passing away from AIDS-related complications in the 1990s.

For the past two years, the artist has made multiple visits to Prospect Cottage, a garden built near a nuclear power station on the coast of Dungeness, Kent, England. This was the private garden of Derek Jarman, the British filmmaker and gay rights activist, who personally designed and cultivated it during the last five or six years of his life. Kang has collected plants that Jarman carefully selected and arranged in his garden, and he has recreated its sculptures—made by Jarman from discarded metal, driftwood, and local stones—through drawings and embroidery using gold thread. Additionally, Kang gathers stones similar to those Jarman once collected and stitches excerpts from Jarman’s garden diaries, replicating both their contents and the filmmaker’s handwriting. Through these meticulous and labor-intensive processes, Kang inscribes Jarman’s life and traces, particularly his resistance to the social stigma of AIDS and homophobia, into a powerful and poignant form of remembrance.

© Kang Seung Lee

At the same time, the artist brings the life of Oh Joonsoo, a Korean gay rights and AIDS activist who passed away at a young age, into historical recognition. The exhibition features archival records from Oh’s activism with Chingusai, a Korean male LGBTQ+ rights organization, as well as personal letters exchanged with friends, and his diaries and poems, which were later published by those close to him. By recreating these materials through drawing and embroidery, Kang not only commemorates Oh’s life but also foregrounds the lives of individuals who have resisted oppression and fought for slow yet persistent social change.

© Kang Seung Lee

In the video work presented in the exhibition, the artist performs a ritualistic gesture by collecting soil from Prospect Cottage and various sites in Seoul that hold memories of Korea’s gay community, including Namsan, Tapgol Park, and Nagwon-dong. He then cuts out parts of his drawings on handmade parchment crafted from animal hide and buries them in these locations, engaging in a performative act of both burial and documentation—an ancient ritual associated with death and memory. The collected soil is mixed and shaped into ceramic objects, which are then displayed throughout the exhibition space. Through these gestures, the artist forges connections between Derek Jarman, Oh Joonsoo, and countless other lives that have been forgotten, unveiling the history of oppression and resistance surrounding LGBTQ+ identities and AIDS. Furthermore, he reveals that the erased histories of stigma and illness have already been inscribed into the soil, plants, and objects we create and leave behind—recorded and transmitted through languages beyond human memory.

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