Installation view of Choi Goen’s “Sunbake” (2023) at Art Sonje Center in central Seoul / Courtesy of Art Sonje Center
By Park Han-sol
Korean artist Choi Goen / Courtesy of Frieze Seoul
Korean artist Choi Goen has been named the winner of the second annual Artist Award at Frieze Seoul, Monday.
The prize, sponsored by Bulgari, aims to support emerging or mid-career talent across the globe by enabling them to develop a new commission for the Frieze Seoul art fair. Last year’s inaugural award went to Woo Hannah, who presented her hanging fabric installation, “The Great Ballroom.”
Choi’s two new large-scale sculptures — “White Home Wall: Welcome” and “Gloria” — will debut at the fair’s third edition, scheduled to run from Sept. 4 to 7 at COEX in Gangnam District, southern Seoul.
The installations, composed of repurposed industrial materials such as exhaust pipes and air-conditioning units, will physically interact with the constant movements taking place at the exhibition venue throughout the event.
For the 39-year-old, the common scrap objects, reborn as sculptures through her artistic rearrangements, are “the birthplace of the processes through which they were produced, distributed, discarded and recycled into other resources,” according to Frieze Seoul. Once brought into the art space, these elements become the material evidence of the usually hidden infrastructure that underpins today’s urban industrial society.
Thus, through its dynamic placement and rhythmic angles, Choi’s new body of work is set to call attention to the ever-changing relationship between the medium of art, technology and urbanity.
“With the Frieze Artist Awards in both Seoul and London spotlighting advanced technologies this year, it will be fascinating to see how two artists interpret this concept differently,” Frieze Seoul Director Patrick Lee said in a statement. “We are privileged to showcase artists of Goen’s caliber at Frieze Seoul, and eagerly anticipate our audience discovering more about her remarkable work.”
The international jury for Frieze Seoul’s 2024 Artist Award included Sungah Serena Choo, curator of the Leeum Museum of Art; Kim Sung Woo, curator and director of Seoul-based art space Primary Practice; Yung Ma, senior curator at the Hayward Gallery in London; and media artist Jeon Joon-ho.
