Why Did Ishtar Go To The Underworld?, 2020



Exhibition Tangible Error at d/p,  Seoul


Why Did Ishtar Go to the Underworld? tries to put together the whole project of The Old and Wrong Way of Seeing Things (2019-2020). In this work, the story covered in Kiss of Chaos (2020), the commissioned work for Looking for Another Family (2020) at the National Museum of Modern and Contemporary Art, Korea, is presented through the myth of the Sumerian goddess Ishtar.  This work takes place in the form of an album release booth of HornyHoneydew's second single Kiss of Chaos ☆ (2020). The release of the album by a K-pop idol HornyHoneydew is a metaphor for the process of ritual in which HornyHoneydew, who has a shaman ego, touches the god Ishtar.  

In the videos and performance works I have been making in recent years, I have become a K-pop idol and a shaman. Through this method of ‘becoming XX,’ I talk about deconstructing myself, and furthermore, dismantling the structure that oppresses myself. Born as a male, I wanted to become an idol member of a girl group when I was a child. But in the world of popular culture and K-pop's heteronormativity and dichotomous gender, this was, of course, impossible. From this experience, I gave myself the role of an idol and started making works from the perspective of the “failure.” Paradise Lost (2016) and Me Gustas Tú (2016), which I worked on in London in 2016, are video works that covered the existing K-pop music video. In these works, I became an idol and objectified and consumed myself. In addition, I expressed queerness by drawing a character who can only exist as a failure in the world of inertial dichotomy.  

In the process of revealing the desire to enter the category of normality and of appropriating cultures that pursue normality, I created a sense of unfamiliarity, oddity, and discomfort. Through this, I attempted to suggest the possibility of queer by showing the process of deconstructing and dismantling such normality and then failing again. In 2018, through the work Purple Kiss ♡ (2018), my K-pop idol ego HornyHoneydew meets shamanism. After studying abroad in Europe, I traveled to South America and became interested in shamanism. I could easily come into contact with shamanism in discussions about post-colonialism, which is being actively studied in non-European regions such as Asia and South America, and tried to unravel the stories of queer, identity, and religion that I have been studying.  

In the past, shamanism was persecuted by Christianity in Europe and declined through colonization, modernization, and religious oppression in non-European countries. For this reason, shamanism was a very interesting topic for me, who has an Asian identity and a queer identity that Christianity taboos.  Gender studies, which are becoming more diverse and complex, have more contacts with shamanism that seeks to understand the world from multiple perspectives rather than European Christian thinking with strong inertial dichotomy. In addition, I thought that I could talk about posthuman and transhuman based on this.  

Purple Kiss ♡ (2018) and Kiss of Chaos (2020) followed the typical K-pop production process. They were produced in collaboration with people who work in the popular culture field, such as hair and makeup artists, vocal trainers, composers, choreographers, music video directors, and costume designers. Meanwhile, while working in Daejeon in 2019, I studied the symbolism of fire in religion revealed through Korean folk religions and a ritual called “Seolwiseolgyeong” in Daejeon and Chungcheongnam-do. Expanding this study, I presented a new sci-fi exhibition Fire and Faggot (2019). Based on the story of Fire and Faggot, I presented Kiss of Chaos (2020), a work in the form of a music video at the 2020 Asia Project at the National Museum of Modern and Contemporary Art. This work was produced with more budget than Purple Kiss ♡, and it might be closer to the existing K-pop music video format. From 2016 to 2020, I can find the characteristic of my music video works gradually developing closer to K-pop. In a way, you might think that my works are becoming non-queer. 

In my works, 'becoming XX,' such as 'becoming a K-pop idol' or 'becoming a shaman,' is a way to reveal the desires of the failure who is out of the orbit of normality. This newly born, objectified self stands at an intersecting and marginal point in the dichotomous world, using its body as a tool. Through this, I try to transcend the confrontational state and serve as a subject that escapes the dualistic way of thought. After all, I talk of a chaotic world that continues to expand through a being that constantly divides itself. 


Dancing In The Night Of Kiss, 2020, mixed media, 270x150x30. Costume design Dehan Hka Son. Commissioned by National Museum of Modern and Contemporary Art, Korea.

Why Did Ishtar Go To The Underworld?, 2020, digital print on adhesive sheets, CD player, CD (Kiss of Chaos ☆), 445x300

 Installation view of Tagible Error at d/p, Seoul