Lee Bul at STPI: Crafting dreamscapes and dystopias

LEE Bul had not planned it. But her new artworks alluding to societal collapse and dystopian visions have an uncanny resonance with the prevailing imagery depicted in today’s headlines. 

South Korea’s leading artist has long been engaged with the social, political and cultural concerns of her time. Her art often provokes viewers to confront the anxieties and fears that permeate modern life, from the impact of technology on human relationships, to the vulnerability of humanity in the face of authoritarian politics.

Her latest sets of prints at STPI, Singapore’s most international gallery, are captivating as they hint at societies in chaos and turmoil. The 59-year-old artist says: “We started working on these prints even before the pandemic. Back then, I would sometimes stand back, look at them and wonder: ‘Are these too dark for the viewer?’

“But then the world was struck by Covid-19, and now we’re faced with another tumultuous chapter of world history… So I guess the answer is: ‘No, they’re not too dark for the viewer’.”

One set of prints, called Untitled – SF, appears like fragments of broken glass or rubble of a destroyed building, with shards piled on each other haphazardly. The work is inspired by an installation Lee created in 2012 and 2016, a large erratically shaped plywood sculpture that invites one to enter. Inside, the sculpture’s unusual construction appears unstable and precarious, with mirrored walls clashing at odd angles, confusing and closing in on the visitor.

Lee has taken inspiration from that installation to create a similar discombobulating experience through Untitled – SF. Although the prints are two-dimensional, they appear almost three-dimensional, courtesy of a laborious process of creating 16 layers of screen- and foil-printing, resulting in unique prints, each with similar forms but differing hues. 

Lee, best known for her sculptures and installations, says: “I’ve always been fascinated with print as a medium. But I wanted a way of evoking my three-dimensional art while also honouring the traditions of the medium. I like the contrast between the old and new, and the flat and three-dimensional. I’m drawn to the contrasts and paradoxes.”

Evoking bombs and destruction

Another set of prints, called Untitled – SI, was created from a collage featuring images of bomb explosions and mushroom-shaped clouds. With painstaking precision, she traced the contours of these ominous objects, filling certain segments with iron filings to evoke their deadly connotations. The iron filings are oxidising, giving the image a dark reddish tint that hints of bloodshed, destruction and decay.

Lee says: “The truth is, I don’t want to think of war and destruction as persistent conditions of humanity. I’ve often tried to mix these visions with a sense of lightness and hope, because, ultimately, that is what life is. It’s not just darkness and pessimism – there are also moments of happiness and hope.”

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For over 40 years, she has consistently delved into complex dichotomies, ranging from utopia-dystopia and hope-despair to organic-artificial and human-machine. Her best exhibitions have deftly woven together elements of science fiction, philosophy and the human experience to ponder the evolving relationship between people and technology.

A recurring motif within her oeuvre is the enigmatic figure of the cyborg, a theme revisited in her latest show. Called Untitled – CC. This series comprises 16 prints, each referencing her 1998 Cyborg W1 sculpture and tinted with copper powder, which turns blue-green when it oxidises.

Asked whether she’s already begun experimenting with artificial intelligence (AI) art, she says, with a laugh: “Not quite yet… Fundamentally, I don’t trust it. They say that AI art is generated by a machine whose processes of aggregating millions of images no one completely understands. But I don’t believe that to be true. I believe there are always people behind it, with specific perspectives. I believe it’s always being controlled on some level.”

Lee Bul’s exhibition at STPI runs from now till Dec 23