Oh Brother Series, 2018
Multi-media installation. (VR, Single-channel videos, & paintings)
The Oh Brother Series is a collection of artworks set within a virtual space inspired by the traditional Korean landscape painting “Sun and Moon and Five Peaks.” Historically displayed behind the king to symbolize sovereign authority, this painting forms the conceptual foundation of the series’ virtual world.
Within this virtual realm, the characters are not autonomous beings with agency but rather partial subjects or objects. One such figure is the Floating Boy, who drifts above the water’s surface in a minimalist landscape, suspended in both space and time. Devoid of sovereignty, yet captivating in his ethereal presence, the Floating Boy invites reflection on the nature of agency and existence in a constructed space. Through the juxtaposition of traditional Korean motifs and contemporary digital media, the Oh Brother Series encourages viewers to question the boundaries between reality and virtuality, as well as the balance of agency and constraint in the digital realm.
Other characters deepen the theme of the relationship between power and authority, history and technology, and the complexities of identity in the digital age. The Violent Boy, for instance, can only express himself through acts of aggression, endlessly pummeling replicas of himself into a bloody pulp. In contrast, the Nature Boy strives to escape his subjecthood by camouflaging himself to merge with the environment. His act of blending in resonates with Jacques Lacan’s notion of mimicry, in which the subject assumes the guise of the Other, dissolving the boundary between self and surroundings, and effectively vanishing into the landscape.
