REVIEWS & STUFF

The first obstacle I had to overcome to view the exhibition was getting there; to say it’s in a less than desirable area of Plymouth would perhaps be an understatement. Never the less, once I arrived at the Karst gallery I was greeted by a large assortment of artists and students who had shown up on the opening night to view the spectacle by Korean artist Jeongmoon Choi.

After negotiating my way through the small garage door into the bare reception I made my way past someone’s dog into the area which held the work. The gallery space had been completely blacked out so that no unintended light could penetrate into the room and compromise the essence of the work. Precisely strung across the room were a large number of illuminated threads glowing bright blue under UV lights. The room was bathed in a purple-blue hue and an assortment of clothing and features were glowing white under the unusual lighting.

It’s interesting to watch how people negotiate a work like this. Anyone involved heavily in the art world would assume to look but not touch but the temptation to run your hand over the strings or to “twang” a thread was overwhelming (and definitely overwhelmed some). I personally didn’t have any idea what I was walking into other than the hint of laser beams present on the promotional postcard so my first instinct was to move my hand through the beams. The threads continued across the floor until they met at one point and disappeared into the wall, if it weren’t for the people standing at the far end of the gallery I would have had a hard time figuring out if I was supposed to walk over them. It felt wrong, as if I was cutting off a circuit’s power with each step.

On the Karst website the work is described as a “visual playground – expected to confound and enchant.” Whilst I agree with enchant, confound implies a degree of ignorance to the methods used. I didn’t leave the exhibition with a mob of people looking to burn Choi at the stake for her deceptive Witchcraft, and whilst I don’t know the exact methods used I have a vague idea of the way in which the spectacle was made. If nothing else I would say the exhibition was fun and the work pretty. Navigating through the web of strings felt more involving than the majority of exhibitions I’ve been to and as someone pointed out it’s reminiscent of laser tag games as a child. I can’t fault the work for how it looked but I can’t help feeling I didn’t take much away from it other than a slight headache.

Installation View KARST / JEONGMOON CHOI : ‘Explorer’ Image © KARST