Exhibition Information

			Leeahn Gallery Seoul is pleased to announce Souls, a solo show featuring two video installations by Los Angeles-based video artist, Jennifer Steinkamp (b.1958~) from September 3rd through Oct 31st. By employing 3D animation software, Steinkamp skillfully coaxes ravishing imagery. On the subject of her artwork, she says, "I am fascinated by software's ability to create ideas we would never conceive of in the natural world." Steinkamp's room-filling immersive animations dissolve the walls in floods of natural elements and blurs the boundary between the viewer and virtual image. This show presents new and recent motion-filled installations, Retinal 1, 2, Still-Life 4 and Judy Crook 12, 14. As she continues to develop her experimental media works, she ceaselessly explores how the light creates space, and affects one's perception of space. 
  The centerpiece, Retinal 1 (2018), Retinal 2 (2019) is inspired by the Bloch building of Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art in Kansas City, designed by the architect, Steven J. Holl. Steinkamp became interested in the fact that windows are referred to as lens. She created computer-generated imagery that bears resemblance to translucent, refractive of optical veins. The drifting clusters of amorphous elements forge links to biomorphic and expressionist abstraction in an entirely digital medium. The work can be construed as a silent invitation to get hypnotized in rhythmic pulse of the digital landscape that ultimately leads to world of meditation. 
  In comparison with 17th century Dutch and Flemish still-life paintings, her gleeful Still-Life 4 (2020) installed on another wall exude a refreshing vibe with colorful fruits and petals floating around. Amidst the current pandemic situation, Steinkamp's work will revitalize the viewer's exhausted mental state. Her art is a reflection on the cyclical nature of life, as a critique of how technology has accelerated contemporary life. Just as the Dutch and Flemish still life paintings were never just about the faithful reproduction of beautiful objects, but instead addresses the way human beings view their objects, the exuberance and recurring nature of Steinkamp’s animations appear to point to certain human experiences. 
  Judy Crook 12, 14 (2019) is from her ongoing series that features digitally animated trees. This body of works immerse viewer within an organic life cycling through four seasons; swirling tree gradually change color, lose leaves, sprout new leaves, grow flowers, and shed its fruits and leaves. This continuous cycle allows the viewer to experience a whole year in few minutes and experience the cyclicality of the nature. This tree series works begins with the influence of Miss Znerold, who praised the sponge tree made by Steinkamp in the first grade class as the best work. Steinkamp titled this series after Judy Crook, the professor of color theory at the Art Center College of Design, Pasadena with a profound admiration. 
  The viewer’s silhouette becomes a part of the imagery as they naturally enter and interact with the work. Steinkamp's work blurs the boundaries of art, viewers, and technology and instantly immerse viewers in new phenomenological territory. 
 
Se-Rim Hong