The weak landscape
hides a grotesque beast
(2018-2022)
The work shows familiar scenes: humans wanting to control nature and nature embracing them. I also create a story that mixes nature and artificial things, using smoke bombs to change the scene and reveal hidden stories.
When we think of landscapes today, we often picture them with including artificial elements. For example, when we think of an 'ocean view', we imagine the night scene with Bridge, or a forest seems incomplete without a temple chimney emitting smoke. I focus on this irony and base my work on documentaries about places with social issues. These include the NIMBY movement at 'Ulsan Airport', 'Water pollution from the Busan-Ulsan highway construction', 'Dams with pest problems due to lack of use', 'Quarries that displaced ancient relics and family graves for resource extraction', 'Ventilation shafts in forests', and 'Expensive billboards in fields'. These scenarios show a capitalist landscape where humans, trying to improve their lives, cause conflicts with nature and each other. If society works this way, humans end up living in an ecosystem where they harm each other.
In these places, I release red smoke. The bomb makes a strong impression on the landscape, staying in people’s minds. The goal of my work is to make people think about the meaning of the smoke bomb, the reason for the color, and the artist's intentions. However, the smoke bomb is mainly meant to create a 'visual shock' rather than have a deep meaning. When we see visual things often, we get used to them. Just like how we consider quarries, roads, sewers in ecological Park, trashy landscapes, or places with Bridge as beautiful, we have become used to these flawed landscapes, so they no longer seem strange. Even though there are big changes happening, we don't notice them and only see the red smoke. Ultimately, if society works this way, humans live in an ecosystem where they harm each other.
