Solo Exhibitions (Brief)

Myoung Ho Lee has held solo exhibitions at major institutions both in Korea and internationally, including Yossi Milo Gallery (New York, 2009/2017), Sungkok Art Museum (Seoul, 2010), Gallery Hyundai (Seoul, 2013/2018), and Savina Museum (Seoul, 2017).

Group Exhibitions (Brief)

Lee has participated in group exhibitions in the Hayward Gallery Southbank Centre (2020), the J. Paul Getty Museum (2019), Kunst Haus Wien (2017), National Gallery of Victoria (2017), and Seoul Museum of Art (2016). 

Awards (Selected)

Lee has received awards such as the Photo Critic Award (The Committee of Photo Critic Award, 2006) and the Artist of Tomorrow (Sungkok Art Museum, 2009). 

Residencies (Selected)

Lee participated in Takeout Drawing Residency (Seoul, Korea, 2013) and LIG Residency (New York, USA, 2014).

Collections (Selected)

Lee’s works are included in renowned collections including Bibliothèque Nationale de France, J. Paul Getty Museum, Fotografiemuseum Amsterdam, National Gallery of Victoria, Museo Arte Contemporáneo Salta, National Museum of Modern and Contemporary Art Korea, and Seoul Museum of Art.

Originality & Identity

Myoung Ho Lee’s practice explores the essence of art through the concept of the “Photography-Act.” He extends photography beyond a tool of representation, transforming it into a philosophical experiment that redefines how reality is perceived. Initiated in 2004, the “Photography-Act Project” embodies his fundamental inquiry into the boundaries between nature and humanity, reality and illusion, revelation and concealment. For Lee, photography is not a technology for producing images but an act of evoking existence itself.

His seminal ‘Tree’ (2004–) series visualizes the act of revelation by placing a white canvas behind trees in nature, isolating them from their natural context. This simple yet profound gesture renders familiar landscapes unfamiliar, encouraging viewers to perceive the world anew. The subsequent ‘Mirage’ (2009–2011) series expands this notion of revelation into the realm of “reenactment,” transforming fragments of reality into another reality and exposing the illusory and fictional dimensions of art.

By the time of the ‘Heritage’ (2015–) series, Lee’s interest had evolved from nature to cultural and man-made structures. In works such as Heritage #3_Seojangdae(2015), he placed a white canvas behind the historic Seojangdae Pavilion, revealing its architectural form and symbolic weight as a cultural memory. Later, in the ‘Nothing, But’ (2018) series, he emptied even the act of revelation itself—leaving only the potentiality of existence. The canvas no longer serves as a reflector of objects but as a metaphor for emptiness and latent possibility.

These artistic developments align with Lee’s belief that art is “the act of uncovering and awakening a corner of the world.” For him, the “Photography-Act” is not about reproducing images but about reconfiguring the relationship between existence and perception. Moving fluidly between presence and absence, reality and trace, he continuously questions how art reveals and reconstructs the world.

Style & Contents

Lee’s formal approach begins with a distinctive synthesis of installation and photography—what might be described as “installation for photography.” In the ‘Tree’ series, the white canvas functions not merely as a backdrop but as a compositional device that restructures reality, flattening landscapes and invoking painterly sensibilities. While he never alters the physical form of his subjects, his performative intervention transforms nature into a conceptual image.

The ‘Mirage’ series pushes this format to its extreme. By stretching a large white fabric across a barren desert, Lee creates the illusion of an oasis or sea shimmering in the distance. This act collapses the distinction between reality and illusion, expanding photography from a medium of reproduction into one of reconfiguration. In contrast, the 9 Minutes’ Layers(2018) series visualizes the accumulation and disappearance of light through digital processes. By overlaying RGB color layers in Photoshop until all forms vanish into white, Lee paradoxically exposes photography’s nature as a record of light—one that dissolves as it intensifies.

At the 2020 Changwon Sculpture Biennale, Tree & Color_Changwon #1(2020) replaced the traditional canvas with a steel panel coated in holographic paint, experimenting with light, reflection, and temporal change. Here, photographic thinking expands into sculptural and spatial practice, as the shifting light and the viewer’s movement complete the work. That same year, the ‘[drənæna]’ (2020) series turned the physical act of “scraping off” ink from a printed photograph into a gesture of both erasure and revelation, materializing the dual notions of disappearance and exposure within the image.

Through these evolving experiments, Lee’s practice has transcended the boundaries of installation, photography, and digital process. The white canvas, once a symbolic reference to painting, has gradually transformed into a conceptual device, a material medium, and an existential metaphor. Within this framework, photography operates not as the act of “taking” an image, but as an expansion of the act of “seeing.”

Topography & Continuity

Through the “Photography-Act,” Myoung Ho Lee has established a unique position within contemporary Korean photography. By integrating performance, installation, and conceptual thought, he challenges the conventional notion of photography as a medium of documentation or reproduction. His works consistently bridge dichotomies—nature and artifice, presence and absence, representation and erasure—redefining the ontological boundaries of the photographic medium.

From Tree, Mirage, and Heritage to Nothing But, 9 Minutes’ Layers, and [drənæna], Lee’s oeuvre demonstrates a gradual conceptual progression. While his early works visualized the relationship between humans and nature, later series expanded toward cultural heritage, temporality, and the metaphysical nature of existence. His installation-based experiments, such as Tree & Color_Changwon #1(2020), further blur the boundaries between mediums, leading photography into a sculptural, time-based dimension.

Collected by major institutions including the National Museum of Modern and Contemporary Art, the J. Paul Getty Museum, and the National Gallery of Victoria, Lee’s work is recognized for merging a distinctly Korean sensibility toward nature with a universal philosophical vision. Through his recurring motif of the “white canvas,” he continues to explore the primal artistic question—“What is it that we reveal?”—with quiet persistence.
Looking ahead, Lee’s practice is likely to deepen its engagement with the material and conceptual duality of photography. Moving across the boundaries of existence and nonexistence, image and action, his work continues to open new possibilities for what may be called “photography after photography” within the global contemporary art discourse.