‘Summer Cocktail, Dreamy Feeling with Blur’, Urban Zone#1, 2017
‘Sometimes The Political is Poetic and Sometimes The Poetic is Political, Urban Zone#2, 2026-2017
‘Technicolour Utopia’,Urban Zone#3, 2014-2017
‘Urban Zone’ by Showna Kim investigates the local community of Seoul. The present time, space and emotions of Seoul move like that of the past ‘Maeul’ (villages) in Korea, with the presence of ongoing abrupt transformations. The old and new mix and boil into one giant bubble complex of hollow spaces constantly popping. The artist attempt to paint this eerie picture of transition in different ways, creating forced dialogues, redefining the meaning of home and dreams through visualization of the people in Seoul. On a micro and macro level, they address the multiple layers of urbanism connecting and disconnecting people and space; and the irony of the people's timely and spatial non-presence in the heightened presence of art and community in rebranding cities.
‘Summer Cocktail, Dreamy Feeling with Blur’, Urban Zone#1, 2017
Photography, installation, mirror acrylic sheet, pigment inkjet ED.580.5x390mm
Showns Kim attempts to describe a neighborhood, called HBC (Haebangchon), as a land of refugees where dramatic social, economic and cultural changes happened in the past few decades. HBC was a poignant symbol of poverty where nostalgic people settled after fleeing from their homeland post-Korean War. This migration continues in a different way until now. Using acrylic sheet to depict a chaotic day scenery in HBC, the work questions the meaning of home now; while people are roaming around the globe under the ideas of globalism and neo-capitalism for better conditions of life in this contemporary era.
‘Sometimes The Political is Poetic and Sometimes The Poetic is Political’, Urban Zone#2, 2016-2017
Photography, installation, mirror acrylic sheet, pigment inkjet ED.580.5x390mm
This work references the changes and alterations to Seoul’s historical districts with the rise of urbanism, and examines the political, social and economic implications of urban transformation. The high-rise (Trade Tower, DDP and Samsung Tower Palace Three) as emblem of national capitalism is shown as a diminished abstraction. Geometric forms and nonlinearities, deformations that occur beyond a material’s yield point, and the gains and losses inherent in the obliteration of traditional spaces is metaphorically considered.
‘Technicolour Utopia’,Urban Zone#3, 2014-2017
Photography, installation, mirror acrylic sheet, pigment inkjet ED.580.5x390mm
The works of ‘Technicolour Utopia’ imagines a virtual future as dream-like visual abstraction. Set in a dense urban factory area undergoing urban renewal, the work’s watery imagery seeks to achieve an ethereal ‘third space’ by mingling colours and reflective surfaces with architectural patterns and textures.
