itle Match is a representative annual exhibition at the Buk Seoul Museum of Art that invites a senior artist who has represented the Korean art world and a younger artist from the 21st century to encourage an inter-generational dialogue. Marking its second year, Title Match: gum nuri vs Hong Jungpyo invites gum nuri (1951~), who has served pioneering roles over various areas of art in the 20th Century Korean art world, and Hong Jungpyo (1976~), a promising artist who has been attracting much attention in the 21st century.
Based on art’s sensitivity, gum nuri has been prominent in all visual art fields ranging from experimental sculpture, installation, performance, and publication. In particular, leading into the second expansion of his avant-garde spirit and artistic soul, was a revolutionary change in his perspective on art and attitude in mid to late 1990s — this spirit still persists today.
Having grown up in the most contemporary environment, Hong Jungpyo explores fundamental questions about contemporary art and art practices. He experiments between the boundaries of art and daily life, representing the process with his refined artistic language. Consequently, his works maximize a purely formal aesthetic and highlight its formal beauty. Although it plainly reveals the limit of art and artist, it also presents a highly refined work containing the artist’s own unique order.
As the exhibition’s title suggests, this exhibition presents ‘confronting’ artistic viewpoints and work attitudes of the two artists, both who have careers in ‘sculpture,’ working in various mediums such as 2D work, sculpture, installation, and performance. These two artists choose materials and mediums of opposing characters and work in contrasting modes. As their works are displayed in one space, subtle collisions and harmonies are formed.
After being selected, the two artists have completed Title Match through continuous meetings and dialogue. Now we can sense the present state of contemporary art and foresee the future by comparing their works and witnessing the amusing reversal of generational gaps. The exhibition represents the artists just as they are, as a young artist who asks, “what is contemporary art?” and the old artist who freely and candidly answers his question.
