As part of a series of sessions I have been taking part in with the Tate Collective Producers at St Ives (virtually at the moment) we were given a tour of Haegue Yang’s current exhibition Strange Attractors by assistant curator Giles Jackson. The notes I took from the tour are as follows:
- Haegue Yang is an internationally exhibiting artist from South Korea (MoMA, Art Review Power 100) – she creates immersive installations, space filling
- Tilted Bushy Lumpy Bumpy – a very playful sculpture (as reflected in the name)
- she chose to display three other artists’ work in the foyer of the exhibition that were influential to her work: Barbara Hepworth, Naum Gabo and Li Yuan-Chia
- she has made an artwork in reponse to a piece by each of these artists
- quite unusual in how she directly references these pieces
- sense of humour present in a lot of the works
- ‘sonic intermediates’ – series of sculptures that make noise
- importance of movement
- large new wallpaper – Non-Linear and Non-Periodic Dynamics – sets the visual mood, as well as working with an underpinning concept
- strange attractors
- Edward Lorenz – meteorologist (Lorenz effect)
- small local changes having larger reaching effects
- also known as the butterfly effect
- a starting point for looking at chaos
- unpredictability of nature
- we can’t harness it – weather, mining (link to Otobong Nkanga’s work)
- we’re subject to nature
- the wallpaper was inspired by Cornwall
- some direct references e.g. waves and rocks
- manifestation of chaos
- hung small paintings on this – lacquer paintings
- record of climate and environment
- two very different bodies of work presented together
- the exhibition is over three spaces
- one space a lot colder/more industrial
- sculptures made from drying racks – used to be foldable but now locked into place
- almost reminiscent of an IV stand – from a particular place and time in her life
- skeletal and naked (in relation to another series where the sculptures are hung with fabric as though they’re clothed)
- like characters
- can see through them out to sea
- Yang specified a particular fabric/curtain backdrop
- colour changes depending on angle like oil slick/holographic
- links to the Pop artists in the next gallery
- a suggestion of movement/potential for movement
- exhibition starts being planned a couple of years in advance
- this one was planned entirely in sketch-up
- before the exhibition Yang did an extensive field trip around Cornwall collecting folklore and local quirks etc
- (in response to a question re how collaborative the exhibition was between Tate staff and Yang) – Yang dictated most of the exhibition
- some collaboration
- Tate do generally try and do commissions
- the Tate like artists who work in responsive ways, who have a reason to be in St Ives
Although the virtual tour was fascinating and a great chance to hear more about the behind the scenes of putting an exhibition together I would still like to have the chance to go and see the exhibition in person after lockdown, in which case I will write more in-depth about the exhibition. The exhibition notes online also contain a lot of useful information for future reference: https://www.tate.org.uk/whats-on/tate-st-ives/exhibition/haegue-yang-strange-attractors/exhibition-guide.
Anna Harris 