Galerie Tschudi

Kimsooja

Work by Kimsooja

Biography

b. 1957, Daegu (KR)

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Currently based in Seoul and Paris, Kimsooja is an internationally acclaimed conceptual artist whose practice explores the conditions of humanity. Working with different media spanning painting, by sewing, installation, performance, video, sound and light, Kimsooja moves form into action, using the materiality of the mediums, and reaching into issues of aesthetics and humanism thereby bringing us to a state of heightened awareness.

In a persistent effort to pursue a transcendence from the material to the non-material, her work evokes the conceptual exploration of “non-doing” and “non-making”. Kimsooja’s work transforms simple and everyday actions into moments of meditation and transcendence. Wrapping and unfolding, tying and untying, connecting and disconnecting, Kimsooja’s art links various dualities and enacts a shift from material to immaterial.

Current Exhibition

The exhibition’s teaser image
Zuoz

22 December 2023 – 23 March 2024

Light Is Therefore Colour

Group Show

On view

Past Exhibitions

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Selected Works

Work by Kimsooja

1/20

Kimsooja

To Breathe – Zurich, 2023

diffraction grating film and mirror floor panels
dimensions variable
KS/I 6

Work by Kimsooja

2/20

Kimsooja

To Breathe – A Mirror Woman, 2018

mirror floor panels, site-specific
(dimensions variable)
KS/I 4

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Work by Kimsooja

3/20

Kimsooja

To Breathe – A Mirror Woman, 2018

mirror floor panels, site-specific
(dimensions variable)
KS/I 4

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Work by Kimsooja

4/20

Kimsooja

To Breathe – A Mirror Woman, 2018

mirror floor panels, site-specific
(dimensions variable)
KS/I 4

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Work by Kimsooja

5/20

Kimsooja

Meta-Paintings, 2019–2023

nanopolymer glass, black lead paint, lead
KS/P 3
KS/P 1

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Work by Kimsooja

6/20

Kimsooja

Meta-Painting (diptych), 2019–2023

nanopolymer glass, black lead paint, lead
17.5 × 17.5 × 0.5 cm each /
20.2 × 20.2 × 3.5 cm each (framed)
KS/P 2

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Work by Kimsooja

7/20

Kimsooja

Thread Routes – Chapter V, 2016

Single channel 16 mm film transferred to HD, 23:40, sound
KS/V 10

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Work by Kimsooja

8/20

Kimsooja

Thread Routes – Chapter V, 2016

Single channel 16 mm film transferred to HD, 23:40, sound
KS/V 10

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Work by Kimsooja

9/20

Kimsooja

Thread Routes – Chapter II, 2011

Single channel 16 mm film transferred to HD, 23:40, sound
KS/V 6

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Work by Kimsooja

10/20

Kimsooja

Thread Routes – Chapter II, 2011

Single channel 16 mm film transferred to HD, 23:40, sound
KS/V 6

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Play/Pause

11/20

Kimsooja

Mandala: Zone of Zero, 2004–2010

Juke Box Speaker on yellow painted wall, Tibetan, Gregorian and Islamic Chants mixed
90 × 90 × 30.5 cm
KS/S 5

Work by Kimsooja

12/20

Kimsooja

Deductive Object: Obangsaek (unrolled), 2014

Semi Worsted Wool Carpet
600 × 120 cm
KS/S 7

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Work by Kimsooja

13/20

Kimsooja

To Breathe: Obangsaek, 2014

site-Specific installation with custom made Obangsaek wallpaper
KS/I 1

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Work by Kimsooja

14/20

Kimsooja

Unfolding Bottari – Geometry of Posession, 1991–2014

223 Inkjet Prints on Hahnemühle paper in two used wooden boxes
Wooden Boxes: 44(L) × 16(W) × 13.5(H) cm each
Prints: 22.5 × 18 cm each
KS/S 11

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Work by Kimsooja

15/20

Kimsooja

The Sun – Unfolded Serie of 6 Prints, 2008

giclée (inkjet) print on Epson Paper
116.5 × 99 (framed) each
KS/F 8

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Work by Kimsooja

16/20

Kimsooja

Bottari, 2011

used Korean bedcover
52 × 55 × 55 cm
KS/S 6

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Work by Kimsooja

17/20

Kimsooja

To Breathe: The Flags, 2012

single channel video
40:41, silent, loop
KS/V 5

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Work by Kimsooja

18/20

Kimsooja

To Breathe: The Flags, 2012

single channel video
40:41, silent, loop
KS/V 5

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Work by Kimsooja

19/20

Kimsooja

Bottaris, 1994–2001

Duraclear Photographic Print, in Light Box
128 × 188.5 × 25.5 cm
KS/F 59

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Work by Kimsooja

20/20

Kimsooja

To Breathe – A Mirror Woman, 2006–2008

Duraclear Photographic Print, in Light Box
119 × 89 × 10 cm
KS/F 4

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Editions & Prints

Books

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News

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Selected Press

Artnet News

See the Astonishing Artworks Planted in the Saudi Arabian Desert

12 February 2024

The latest Desert X AlUla biennial features 15 newly commissioned pieces that explore the unseen.

Monopol

Kimsooja in Berlin

27 October 2023

Im Humboldt Forum hat diese Woche die Ausstellung "(Un)Folding Bottari" eröffnet, in der die koreanische Künstlerin Kimsooja auf Einladung des Museums für Asiatische Kunst sowohl ältere Werke als auch eigens entworfene Arbeiten zeigt. Zentral sind Fragen nach Migration und Heimatlosigkeit, aber auch der Versuch, Heimat wiederzufinden und anzukommen, in koreanischer sowie globaler Sprache.

Berliner Morgenpost

Ein Bündel voller Überraschungen

Volker Blech

24 October 2023

Die südkoreanische Künstlerin Kim Soo-ja wird in der Sonderausstellung „(Un)Folding Bottari“ im Humboldt Forum vorgestellt

Kunstbulletin

Kimsooja / Augustas Serapinas — Schwindel und Schwere

3/2023

Zuoz / Zürich — Es wird vor Schwindel gewarnt, Tiere sind nicht erlaubt. Es gibt fast nur Licht und Luft zu sehen. Gerade deshalb entfaltet die Rauminstallation ‹To
Breathe – Zurich› der koreanischen Künstlerin Kimsooja eine so starke Wirkung, nicht nur im Kopf, sondern im gesamten Körper: Die spiegelnden Platten am Boden des kürzlich eröffneten Zürcher Ablegers der Galerie Tschudi erweitern den Raum um viele Dimensionen. Die Folie an den grossen Fensterflächen bricht das Licht und vervielfacht die Bewegungen und das Farbenspiel der Aussenwelt.

CoBo

Seeds of Hope: Kimsooja on Nature, Nurture and Musings on Life

Christina Ko

23 August 2021

Caught between personal tragedy and a global pandemic, Kimsooja found solace in a field of dreams. Her art practice continues to merge elements of beauty, impermanence and universality, effortlessly and paradoxically cutting to the core of contemporary culture.

#Legend

Artist Kimsooja connects through the glass

Ilana Jacobs

21 October 2021

When does an audience stop seeing the artist and start seeing what the artist is looking at? That’s just one of the many questions posed by conceptual multimedia artist Kimsooja, whose latest exhibition opens this month in Seoul

ArtReview

Artist Kimsooja Plants the Seed of an Idea

Mark Rappolt

5 August 2020

At Wanås Konst, Sweden, the artist’s project ‘Sowing into Painting’ returns culture to nature.
While most people were locking down this May, Korean artist Kimsooja was hanging out laundry, in a wood northeast of Malmö, not too far from the border between Sweden and Denmark.

Kunstforum

SCHAUENDES DENKEN

Doris von Drathen

2020

Zweimal in ihrem 37-jährigen Werk hat sich die süd-koreanische Künstlerin auf ihr persönliches Leben bezogen. Im Herbst 2019 stellt Kimsooja einen 6 mal 2,4 mal 2,6 Meter großen Container auf den Platz vor die Kathedrale von Poitiers (s. Kunstforum Nr. 265) und markiert damit ihren Abschied von New York, wo sie, seit den ersten Stipendien bis heute, fast 30 Jahre gelebt hatte. Ein radikaler Wendepunkt, denn seither pendelt Kimsooja zwischen Seoul und Paris, wo sie sich vielleicht in der Zukunft niederlassen wird, auch wenn sie längst im Unterwegssein zuhause ist.

The Brooklyn Rail

Works and Process

David Ebony

2013

To Breathe: Bottari, Kimsooja’s exhibition at the Korean Pavilion, was one of the most memorable presentations at the 2013 Venice Biennale. The Korean-born New York-based artist had the audacity to offer visitors an anechoic—or sensory deprivation—chamber off the main gallery of the pavilion, which served as an antidote to the sensory-overload that is the hallmark of most Biennale installations. Visitors to the pavilion were obliged to remove their shoes before entering and sign a waiver relieving the show’s organizers of responsibility for claustrophobia-induced maladies like heart-attack or stroke.

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