Exhibition Information

Blue Cat #00
1999 Courtesy of CODY CHOI & PKM Gallery Vutek Ink on Mesh Canvas 182.88 x 243.84 cm

t.Cat 1-1A/Database Painting
2000 Courtesy of CODY CHOI & PKM Gallery Vutek Ink on Mesh Mounted on Canvas 152.4 x 213.3 cm

Animal Totem/Death Cult 0496#B32E
2000 Courtesy of CODY CHOI & PKM Gallery Vutek Ink on Mesh Canvas 170.18 x 119.38 cm

We are all mirror
2021 Courtesy of CODY CHOI & PKM Gallery mirror ball, light, vary

			PKM Gallery is pleased to present 1999 Cody Choi + NFT, a solo exhibition by Cody Choi (b. 1961) who earned international renown as the pioneer of digital art. The original digital file of Choi’s Database Painting series, which was created between 1999-2000 and recently minted into NFTs, is on display at the exhibition. His works printed on large mesh canvas which were created prior to the current debates about the originality of digital files are brought again into the exhibition space.

Now is the time of parallel world which the reality and virtuality co-exist in our daily lives. We cannot imagine a day without our smartphones as we depend on data and information in the cyberspace for necessities of life. Moreover, we can easily see several companies from the VR/AR market in the top world ranking of companies based on market capitalization. This pertains to the fact that virtual economy has surpassed its previous economic value and the era of dual economy characterized by its coexistence with the real economy has arrived. It is the dawning of a new era. Amidst the context appeared NFT art. Due to NFT which prevents unauthorized reproduction and counterfeit, digital production such as image, music or video could acquire its own presence and the authenticity and significance of digital art could be acknowledged. However, it is still difficult to find NFT art with a strong background in fine art and encapsulates artistic concept of digital art.

Cody Choi, with his insight ahead of its time, examined the newly created and converged universe within the digital space using accumulation, multiplication, and duplication of database. For database paintings, creation is not an action based on artist’s imagination but is about constructing a new type of painting based on electronic database that existed before the artist’s selection. Elements of digital creation are neither original nor related to an individual’s imagination; they are entirely provided from database.

Acknowledging that the essence of digital technology is in the formation of new values established from data processing, Choi produced image files through accumulation and multiplication of data which its process is identical to current blockchain technology although it was performed much before the advent of blockchain. As a result of Choi’s conceptual practice in ‘establishment of digital culture’, his early Database Painting series aims to provide an insight into NFT art.

Cody Choi majored in sociology at Korea University and design and fine arts in Art Center College of Design in United States. In the mid-90s, Choi gained early fame as an international artist through his solo project exhibition at Deitch Projects (New York, US), The Thinker, December (1996), and at Museum of Contemporary Art (Marseille, France), L'ART AU CORPS: le corps exposé de Man Ray à nos jours (1996), an opening commemoration group exhibition. From 2015 to 2017 he had retrospective traveling exhibition in Kunsthalle Düsseldorf (Düsseldorf, Germany), Museum of Contemporary Art (Marseille, France), Kunstsammlungen-Chemnitz (Chemnitz, Germany), organized by a well-known art historian John C. Welchman. In 2017, Choi was selected as the representing artist for the Korean Pavilion at the 2017 Venice Biennale. He also served as an Adjunct Professor at New York University from 1994 to 2004. His publications Topography of 20th Century Culture(2006), Topography of Contemporary Culture(2010) have caused great sensation in the Korean art world. His early Database Paintings are included in the collections of famous individual collectors including Peter Halley, Mike Kelly, Robert Rosenblum and John C. Welchman.