Haegue Yang at Modern Art Oxford

Modern Art Oxford

Haegue Yang
Teacher of Dance
11 June­4 September 2011

Modern Art Oxford
30 Pembroke Street
Oxford OX1 1BP
T +44 (0)1865 722733
info@modernartoxford.org.uk.

Modern Art Oxford presents Teacher of Dance, the first major UK exhibition
of
the Seoul- and Berlin-based artist Haegue Yang. Yang has developed a
distinctive practice of colourful and sensorial installations and sculptures
that seek to occupy the spaces where public and private meet and contend
with
one another. Through her work, Yang discloses narratives, individual
portraits
and her own sentiments, reflecting the balance of research and intuitive
enquiry that underlies her practice. She predominantly uses materials drawn
from the domestic realm, yet employs an abstract language to free the work
from any narratives that influenced her production process.

The exhibition, whose title references the spiritualist thinker and teacher
G.
I. Gurdjieff, is guided by an interest in movement and the role it plays in
the formation and experience of Yang's work. It includes not only major past
works but also newly conceived pieces. Commissioned to produce a new work
for
the Piper Gallery, Yang has created a Venetian blind installation&lsqauo;a form she
has rigorously pursued for the past six years&lsqauo;that for the first time
escapes
eye level, representing a departure from what has been a defining
characteristic of these installations. The work is formed of two distinct
parts that visitors can move underneath and within: the first conceptually
transforms the artist's relationship to the Venetian blind, from a
semi-transparent material that is looked through, to an object that is to be
looked at; the second, referencing the stereometric costumes of Oskar
Schlemmer's Triadisches Ballett (1922), comprises floor-based structures
that
can be entered into and moved around.

The breadth of Yang's practice is revealed through work in a variety of
media
from the past decade of her practice, with individual works often forming a
constituent part of a family of objects. Occupying the Upper Gallery is a
group of vibrantly coloured and highly textured sculptures entitled
Non-Indépliables, (Non-Unfoldables), 2006/2009­11. These works, drying racks
wrapped in fabric and knitted material, deftly transform a functional and
intrinsically foldable household item into a strongly figurative yet fixed
sculpture.

PUBLICATION

To coincide with the exhibition, Modern Art Oxford is producing a fully
illustrated catalogue in collaboration with the Aspen Art Museum, Colorado,
focusing on Yang's exhibitions at the two institutions. The catalogue
contains
two major essays by Professor Julian Stallabrass, Reader at the Courtauld
Institute, and Professor Anne Wagner, The Henry Moore Foundation Research
Curator at Tate. It also contains a text by Heidi Zuckerman Jacobson,
Director
and Chief Curator, Aspen Art Museum, an interview with Haegue Yang by Emily
Smith, Curator, Modern Art Oxford, and a biographical text by Katharina
Schwerendt. The book has been developed in a close collaboration between the
designer Manuel Raeder and Haegue Yang.

TALKS

Saturday 3 September, 2­5pm
Anne Wagner Haegue Yang
Professor Anne Wagner, The Henry Moore Foundation Research Curator at Tate,
gives a lecture on Haegue Yang's practice focusing on the status of the
ordinary object in Yang's sculpture. The lecture will be followed by a
conversation between Wagner and Haegue Yang.
Booking essential

G. I. GURDJIEFF WORKSHOP PRESENTATION

Friday 15 July, 3­5pm
Workshop: G. I. Gurdjieff Movements
Booking essential

Friday 15 July, 7pm
G. I. Gurdjieff Movements Presentation
A presentation of Gurdjieff movements by specialist practitioners. Gurdjieff
sacred dances and movements stem from ancient
traditions that were noted down by the Armenian mystic and spiritual teacher
G. I. Gurdjieff (1866­1949). The movements are explored in Haegue Yang's new
installation created for Modern Art Oxford, where a network of suspended
Venetian blinds map out an intricate geometric formation.
Booking essential

Modern Art Oxford, 30 Pembroke Street, Oxford OX1 1BP. Tel. +44 (0)1865
722733. Email: info@modernartoxford.org.uk. www.modernartoxford.org.uk
<http://www.modernartoxford.org.uk>

Open Tuesday Wednesday 10am­5pm, Thursday to Saturday 10am­10pm, galleries
until 7pm, Sunday 12pm to 5pm, closed Mondays.

Admission Free.