Lim is known for creating evocative architectural forms that are illuminated by projected moving and still images. Her installations use cinematic spectacle and wonder to create animated monuments and haunting landscapes.
Won Ju Lim: In Many Things to Come, will be presented in the Clare Boothe Luce
Gallery at the Honolulu Academy of Arts October 5 through November 26, 2006. This
presentation is the third in a series of exhibition of works by internationally
known contemporary artists, which was initiated by the Academy in 2005.
Born in Gwangju, South Korea in 1968, Won Ju Lim was educated at the Art Center
College of Design in Pasadena, CA. Lim has exhibited in solo exhibitions in Los
Angeles, London, Berlin, and Madrid, and has been featured in group shows including
ARCO 06, Madrid; the 2002 Gwangju Bienniale; and the 2001 Munster Sculpture
Biennial. Presently, Lim is included in exhibitions in Germany at the Center for
Art and Media, Karlsruhe and the Wilhelm Hack Museum, Ludwigshafen. A resident of
Los Angeles, Lim also teaches on the UCLA faculty.
Lim is known for creating evocative architectural forms that are illuminated by
projected moving and still images. Her installations use cinematic spectacle and
wonder to create animated monuments and haunting landscapes that lead viewers
through a journey of colors, shadows and light to ponder themes like fantasy,
longing, nostalgia and remembrance. For this commissioned work, Lim has chosen to
focus on Hawaii
In Many Things to Come begins with the premise that a visitor’s experience of Hawaii
is, in part, a packaged commodity manufactured by a powerful tourism-industrial
complex. The recognition of this aspect of Hawaii raises questions about the
process of conveying, representing and remembering the “essence" of Hawaii. This is
particularly meaningful when such questioning explores what is excluded or distorted
in representing a “pristine" or “authentic" experience - a type of experience that
always proves to be elusive. In Many Things to Come explores this nexus through the
recognition that the touristic packaging of Hawaii is meant to elicit nostalgia,
recollection and ultimately, a return visit to a place that will eventually be
acknowledged by the visitor as part dreamy fabrication. Through its use of iconic
images, sculptural forms and cinematic projections from Hawaii, In Many Things to
Come provocatively presents the affects, effects and residue of a form of
recollection
made complex by touristic inventions and interventions.
Lim will give a free lecture about her work on October 8, 2006 at 4 p.m. in The
Doris Duke Theatre. Won Ju Lim: Spectral Forms 1996-2006 will focus on the last
ten years of her work and discuss excerpts from the writings of Italo Calvino,
Marcel Proust, and Susan Stewart as they relate to her haunting sculptural
installations. Seating is limited and offered on a first-come, first served basis.
In Many Things to Come is the third in the Academy’s annual series of international
contemporary art presentations that began in 2005 with Neo Rauch Works 1994-2002:
The Leipziger Volkszeitung Collection (February 10 - April 17, 2005), the artist’s
only United States museum exhibition. The series continued with Bjorn
Melhus: Eastern_Western_Park (December 21, 2005 - January 22, 2006).
In Many Things To Come is supported by a grant from the American Center Foundation
Artist Lecture
Won Ju Lim:
Spectral Forms 1996-2006
October 8, 2006 at 4 p.m.
The Doris Duke Theatre
Opening: 5 October 2006
Honolulu Academy of Arts
900 South Beretania Street - Honolulu