Ayoung Kim, Delivery Dancer’s Sphere (still cut), 2022, Single channel video, 25 min © Ayoung Kim

Ayoung Kim’s Delivery Dancer’s Sphere takes part in the 52nd IFFR Rotterdam International Film Festival (January 25 – February 5, 2023, Rotterdam, Netherlands), one of the top ten film festivals in the world, as part of the Ammodo Tiger Short Competition. The Ammodo Tiger Short Competition that Ayoung Kim participates in is a competition of experimental short films between one and 63 minutes long, representing the intersection between film and Contemporary Art. 24 works in total by international artists including Ayoung Kim have been chosen for the world premiere.

Delivery Dancer’s Sphere will be screened on Saturday, January 28 at 8PM at Pathé Cinema 6 in Pathé Schouwburgplein; on Sunday, January 29 at 12:45PM at Pathé Cinema 2 in Pathé Schouwburgplein; and Friday, February 3, 2:15PM at Kino 3 in KINO Rotterdam. The January 28 and 29 screenings will be accompanied by a Q&A session.

Ayoung Kim’s Delivery Dancer’s Sphere is a 25-minute-long video work that investigates the semi-coerced movements of our contemporaries who are controlled by app algorithms via the collection of digital footprint. It was featured in her solo exhibition 《Syntax and Sorcery》 at Gallery Hyundai, followed by positive reviews by international art world figures who had visited Seoul for Frieze Seoul and KIAF.

This work centers on the encounters between female delivery rider Ernst Mo (an anagram of “Monster”) who works for a powerful delivery platform Delivery Dancer and her alternate world counterpart En Storm (also an anagram of “Monster”). The unique worldview and relationship between two main characters who fight, empathize, and love, are results of the artist’s broad interpretations of concepts of possible worlds and quantum mechanics.

As if to visualize the myriad possibilities of the material supports of hybrid or multiple realities as well as possible worlds, the artist experiments with hybrid methods of image production. Based on live-action filming of the ominous, gloomy streets of rainy Seoul, the artist actively utilized various modes of image production such as volumetric 3D figure scanning, game engines, and digital avatar creation tools. And by placing productions with scenes filmed live-action, she expands her interest in “magical beings that transcend syntax” into an implementation of form and medium.

On the other hand, Ayoung Kim’s global pursuits extend from film to the art world. She will be participating as a panel member in the talk Unconscionable Maps at 《transmediale 2023: a model, a map, a fiction》 (February 1 – February 5, 2023) held at Berlin’s Akademie der Künste. The talk, scheduled for February 3, also features Marco Ferrari as moderator, and artists Evan Roth (U.S) and Suzanne Treister (U.K) as panel members alongside Ayoung Kim.

Ayoung Kim, Porosity Valley 2 Tricksters' Plot (still cut), 2019, two-channel video, 23 min 4 sec © Ayoung Kim

This is followed by 《Sharjah Biennial 15: Thinking Historically in the Present》 (February 7 – June 11, 2023 in Sharjah, UAE). This installment of the Sharjah Biennial was organized by Hoor Al Qasimi, director of the Sharjah Art Foundation. At this biennial, Ayoung Kim presents her major works Porosity Valley 2: Tricksters’ Plot (2019), Crossings (2019), Plot Diagram (2019), and Pangea Elements (2019), which were introduced at the 《Korea Artists Prize exhibition (2019, National Museum of Modern and Contemporary Art, Seoul, Korea)》.

The Porosity Valley series embarked in 2017 and remains one of the artist’s most iconic works. In this series, the artist examined multifaceted conditions of migration including movements of geological strata, problems of refugee society close to our reality, and immaterial movements of data and information. Video work Porosity Valley 2: Tricksters’ Plot (2019) more actively expands fictional narratives surrounding such problematics of migration and intensifies them with the imagination of science fiction.

Ayoung Kim’s participating works at the 《Sharjah Biennale》 therefore represent the expansive scope of her creative practice that traverses mineralogy, geology, mythology, composition of speculative fiction, worldbuilding, and mythmaking.

References