HYE RIM LEE

HYE RIM LEE

Hye Rim Lee is a New York based Korean - New Zealand artist. Her 3D animations question new technology’s role in image making and representation. Her work has evolved and grown with critical exploration and conceptually evolving through representation of TOKI characters in her ongoing TOKI/Cyborg Project since 2002. Her work is ambitious, expansive, conceptually driven and technically honed: each new project surpassing the previous genesis of TOKI.

Lee's photos, as well as her video installations, tell a fantasy tale based on the intermingling of Eastern and Western popular cultures, and the study of new technologies and how they influence tradition. She is involved in the critical exploration of questions dealing with modern visual culture from a complex point of view in which different approaches are used. The graphics used in her work inevitably refer to the manga tradition, but are mixed with Western aesthetic ideals, thus giving life to transgender, transcultural characters who live in an imaginary world governed by testosterone. Through an exploration of videogame dynamics, intended for a male public, and a fascination with new technologies, the artist has used a different point of view to analyze some aspects of popular culture, globalization and especially femininity in relation to the media. Through her numerous works she demonstrates that the exploitation of the female body is still very much relevant.

She has promised a continuation of her challenge to what she calls the “phallic motivations” of dominant cyber culture, computer gaming, contemporary myth and animamix in the engagement with high technology and popular culture.

Lee’s work has been exhibited widely in the major solo and group exhibitions at: Max Lang Gallery NY, Gallerie Volker Diehl Berlin, Monte Clark Gallery, Vancouver, MoCA Shanghai, Today Art Museum Beijing, Fundacio Joan Miro Barcelona, Starkwhite Auckland, Kukje Gallery Seoul, San Jose Museum of Art, Museum of Contemporary Art Korea, Govett Brewster Art Gallery New Plymouth, Adam Art Gallery Wellington, numerous collateral exhibitions in the 54th Venice Biennale and the 53rd Venice Biennale, Incheon Womens Art Biennale, Animamix Biennale, The World Expo 2010 Shanghai and artfairs including Basel, FIAC, Frieze, Armory Show, Basel Miami, Art HK. She won the artist residency: Ssamzie Space Seoul and ISCP New York. She was awarded funding from Creative New Zealand, NZ Film Commission, and Asia New Zealand Foundation. Her works become part of major art collection: Govett-Brewster Art Gallery, Adam Art Gallery, Te Papa, The University of Auckland, Ernst&Young, Saatchi&Saatchi NZ, Hara Museum, National Museum of Contemporary Art Korea and major private collections worldwide.