Young Joon Kwak & Eusung Lee

INSTALLATION VIEW “Young Joon Kwak & Eusung Lee“, 2025. Courtesy of the Artist and Esther Schipper.

 

Esther Schipper is pleased to present Jarred Kitchen, a solo exhibition with works by Karolina Jabłońska in our Paris gallery.

 

For this presentation, Young Joon Kwak’s Choreography for Divine Transitions (Gestures) (2025), an expansive, cumulative group of sculptural works, is arranged center stage. Cast from friends and collaborators, the sculptures represent an ensemble of bodily fragments. Each sculpture’s concave resin surface is burnished with pigmented wax, “fleshing out” embodied impressions. A shield covered with shards of mirrored glass, the convex shells act as protection––and lure the viewer into an orchestrated encounter. Trans 삼태극 (2025), a new relief by the artist is adorned by rhinestones in pastel pinks, blues, and iridescent white. Shimmering, refracting the gallery’s spotlights, the tondo’s color code references the transgender pride flag. In a symbolic gesture Kwak reenvisions, in their own words, “the traditional primary color scheme of sam-taegeuk––representing earth, heaven, and humanity––to embrace and safeguard all bodies in transformation.”

Eusung Lee’s tripartite wall sculptures Eponym, Bucentaur, and Study of Model A (all 2025) are installed throughout the exhibition space. Part of her Symbolon series, they depict bisected halves: a hand-carved wooden leg, wings made of fabric and yarn, a metallic model of Alef’s flying car. These works appear to be on a collision course propelled by flights of fancy and technological innovations. With their seams exposed, their uncanny compositions reveal fissures in the building blocks of evolutionary progress. Co-opting a visual lexicon of movement and accelerated speed, the Symbolon series explores the boundaries of imagination confounded by fraught egos.

 

A written conversation between Young Joon Kwak and Eusung Lee accompanies the exhibition.

 

INSTALLATION VIEW “Young Joon Kwak & Eusung Lee“, 2025. Courtesy of the Artist and Esther Schipper.

INSTALLATION VIEW “Young Joon Kwak & Eusung Lee“, 2025. Courtesy of the Artist and Esther Schipper.

 

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