Insomnis
Heesoo Agnes Kim

As part of her ongoing project that seeks to find the green ray in different locations during the nighttime around the globe, Heesoo Agnes Kim shared with the local public a video performance excerpt. During the opening, Agnes was able to converse with the guests about her process, her interests and the personal and artistic reasons behind such a quest. Her video installation opened on Tuesday, December 6th 2022 and remained open until Friday, December 23rd 2022, the day we close the studio for the summer recess.

Together with Agnes, her Korean colleague Hee Ju Im opened her exhibition, and we also hosted the work of our residents Michael Sell (USA), Alex Karolyi (Canada) and Marcela Caballero (Argentina).

ABOUT INSOMNIS by Heesoo Kim

I have been interested in the boundaries of time, light, and life that cannot be conceptualized fragmentarily, as well as the imperfection of structuralized language. Notably, I pay attention to the boundaries between language and concepts that can be seen at the junctions among time, light, and life, and our uncertain life influenced by them. Among the series of natural and social phenomena derived through them, I use the properties of light as a kind of MacGuffin in my work. Light, while it reveals indeterminacy within my work and projects the boundary between time and life, it is operated as a tool that do not expose the meaning.

INSOMNIS Travailler à l’heure bleue is a performance video leading from nighttime till the sunrise. Insomnia, a word derived from the Latin word ‘insomnis’ that means lack of sleep, was described using the word ‘agrypnotic’ in Greek that also means ‘to pursue sleep’ or to actively pursue something that is missing. In the title INSOMNIS Travailler à l’heure bleue, ‘travail’ which means ‘to work’ in French is derived from the Latin word ‘tripalium’ that is believed to have meant a torture instrument constituting of three stakes. It is also related to the English word ‘travel.