Afterbody 2.0 - K-ARTIST

Afterbody 2.0

2024
Performance
About The Work

Suwha Kim (b. 1990) has developed performance-based works that reflect on the body within social and cultural contexts, focusing on the events and bodily sensations that arise at the intersection of the body and media. Her practice draws attention to the gaps created by human perception—which evolves far more slowly than rapidly advancing media technologies.
 
Through this lens, Kim poses questions about how connection and communication occur through the body and media in contemporary society, and how the meaning of the collective is formed and unraveled within technology as it passes through the body.
 
Suhwa Kim’s practice explores the diverse contexts and environments surrounding our bodies today, translating the often imperceptible sensations of these gaps into language, action, and objects for visualization. Her work not only reminds us of the subtle senses we tend to overlook while living amid the fragmented perceptions of rapidly evolving digital media but also enables us to become aware of our continuously renewing bodily sensations.

Solo Exhibitions (Brief)

Suhwa Kim has held solo exhibitions including 《Square Practice: My references, from a nowhere》 (Seoul Artists Support Center, Seoul, 2025) and 《We meet there》 (Jamunbak Art Residency, Seoul, 2024).

Group Exhibitions (Brief)

Suhwa Kim has also participated in group exhibitions and festivals such as 《MMCA Performing Arts 2024 Showcase》 (MMCA, Seoul; Denmark Art Hub Copenhagen, Copenhagen, 2024), 《Ob/Scene Festival 2022》 (Mullae Gallery M30, Seoul, 2022), 《UK[REP] Festival》 (MG+MSUM(Museum of Contemporary Art Metlkova), Ljubljana, 2022), and more. 

Awards (Selected)

Kim was previously selected for the Multidisciplinary BENXT program at Mullae Art Space, Seoul Foundation for Arts and Culture (2021).

Residencies (Selected)

Kim was previously selected for the ART SPACE stift Millstatt Festival and Residency (2022, Austria).

Works of Art

The Deep Exploration of Bodily Perception

Originality & Identity

Suhwa Kim’s artistic inquiry begins with a reconsideration of the body’s position within socio-cultural contexts. Early performances such as Threshold (2021) pose essential questions about where the body should locate itself and what it should face in a world where place and placelessness increasingly overlap. This becomes a foundational exploration of presence and physical perception.

Her later works focus on the sensory disconnection and asynchronicity produced by digital technologies. In Screengraphy (2021), she observes the mismatch between body and media in environments involving cameras, video-communication tools, and virtual reality. When shared sensory experience collapses, the body becomes what she calls a “hesitant object.”

Expanding further, works such as Metahands (2022) and the solo exhibition 《We meet there》(2024) investigate how new forms of collectivity may emerge as bodies interact with invisible frequency networks. Though dispersed into flows of data, the body continues to renegotiate and reclaim the sensory notion of “we.”

More recent works—including the performance series ‘Afterbody’ (2024–2025) and Square Practice: My references, from a nowhere (2025)—experiment with an expanded corporeality that transcends physical structure. The “afterbody” emerges as a non-fixed entity that acts as a sensory mediator within technological environments.

Style & Contents

Kim performs across theaters, outdoor spaces, and screens. Her early works utilize concise movement structures focusing on gaze, posture, and spatial thresholds, exemplified by Threshold.

From 2021 onward, technological media become central. Screengraphy actively rearranges the boundaries among virtual, representational, and physical space in real time, engaging audiences through non-physical perception. This phase highlights the failures of synchronization between technology and the body.

Since 2023, Kim has used wireless frequency–based sensory-conversion devices. Works such as Connecting practice: we meet there (2024) and Moving unpredicted (2024) convert Wi-Fi signal “Android 9707” into fragmented language or sound triggered by fluctuations in signal strength. The body becomes unstable—suspended between data rhythm and sensory presence.

In ‘Afterbody’ and Square Practice, the stability of data systems collides with the variability of physical sensation. Unpredictable signals generate choreographic structures, and the body appears as a necessary variable—an interruption within technological precision. The relationship between technology and the body shifts from directive to co-generative.

Topography & Continuity

Suhwa Kim consistently explores perceptual gaps—the interval between sensory bodies and technological systems. Rather than depicting the body as subordinate to technology, she asserts it as the site through which technological experience becomes re-sensitized, situating her practice at an important point within contemporary performance discourse.

Her focus has evolved from spatial presence in early works to expanded data-driven environments, where the body functions as a catalyst for new forms of collective experience. This direction confronts social fragmentation in the digital age while reopening the possibility for sensory solidarity.

Her participation in platforms such as the 《MMCA Performing Arts 2024 Showcase》 (MMCA Seoul / Art Hub Copenhagen) and 《Ob/Scene Festival 2022》 demonstrates a steadily expanding international presence. Ongoing research at CCN Montpellier further supports her engagement within broader European performance contexts.

Looking ahead, Kim is set to continue advancing new ontologies of the body and the politics of incomplete perception. Through multi-media performance, she will remain a vital contributor to shaping discourse around corporeality in the digital era.

Works of Art

The Deep Exploration of Bodily Perception

Articles

Exhibitions

Activities