Haegue Yang was born in 1971 in Seoul, Korea, graduating with a BFA from Seoul National University Fine Arts College in 1994. After emigrating to Germany, she studied for a Meisterschüler from the Frankfurt Städelschule, (1999). She lives and works in Berlin and Seoul.

Yang finds a transcendent quality and elegance in everyday domestic materials and objects, such as venetian blinds. Her constructed sculptures and installations are frequently transformed through sensory experiences using light and scent. Zig Zag from her series Dress Vehicles is a mobile sculpture. At the crossover between sculpture, performance and design, it is inspired by Oscar Schlemmer’s Bauhaus costumes. Performers animate the work by ‘dancing’ with it.

She has had solo exhibitions at Portikus, Frankfurt (2008), the Walker Art Center, Minneapolis (2009–10), The New Museum, New York (2010–11), and Kunsthaus Bregenz (2011). She represented Korea at the Biennale di Venezia (2009) and has participated in the Bienal de São Paulo (2006). Recently she took part in dOCUMENTA (13) in Kassel, Germany (2012). In 2013 she carried out a three month residency at Glasgow Sculpture Studios which was exhibited at GSS in December 2013. 

Glossary

  • Design

    The arrangement of elements or details in an artefact or a work of art.

  • Sculpture

    A three-dimensional work of art. Such works may be carved, modelled, constructed, or cast. Sculptures can also be described as assemblage, in the round, relief, and made in a huge variety of media. Contemporary practice also includes live elements, as in Gilbert & George 'Living Sculpture' as well as broadcast work, radio or sound sculpture.

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