Past Residents
Past Resident2012: Bunkacho - Agency for Cultural Affairs, Government of Japan
Yamashita + Kobayashi
Mai Yamashita + Naoto Kobayashi are a Berlin-based artist duo. The simple structure and humor in their methodology turns the seemingly impossible dream into reality and their work is a condensation of everyday life. In Candy (2005), for instance, the duo licked a huge ball of candy every day over six months until it had been reduced to normal size. In Infinity (2006), Yamashita + Kobayashi jog day after day over a course in the shape of the sign for infinity (∞), slowly inscribing itself on the grass. Their sincere attitude towards these seemingly purposeless duties contains a touch of humor and at the same time makes viewers reconsider about many rituals without meaning in their daily lives.
Mai Yamashita (born in 1976) and Naoto Kobayashi (born in 1974) are a Japanese artist couple who started working together in 2000. After graduating from Tokyo University of the Arts with a PhD, they moved to Germany, where they have been living and working since then. They participated in Künstlerhaus Bethanien and their work has been exhibited among others at Kiasma Museum of Contemporary Art, Helsinki, Finland; Museo de Arte Contemporánea (MARCO), Vigo, Spain and the 2010 Aichi Triennale, Japan.
Yamashita + Kobayashi, Going Mainstream, 2010, Installation view at Aichi Triennale. Courtesy of the artist
Yamashita + Kobayashi, Lion & Canvas, 2008, HD video, and canvas, 40.22 min. Courtesy of the artist
Yamashita + Kobayashi, Infinity, 2006, HD video, 04.38 min. Courtesy of the artist
Yamashita + Kobayashi, Candy, 2005, DVD candy, and glass bowl, 19.22 min. Courtesy of the artist
Yamashita + Kobayashi, How To Make A Mountain Sculpture (Eiger, Mönch, Jungfrau), 2006, C-print, 19 × 28 in. (48.26 × 71.12 cm). Courtesy of the artist
Past Resident2012: Conseil des arts et des lettres du Québec
Jean-Michel Ross
Jean-Michel Ross’s curatorial practice questions the spatial relationship and interaction between objects and subjects. He creates different contexts through fiction and narration to build dialogue with artists and interact with their works. His projects often reflect upon hierarchy, freedom, universality, neutrality, equivalence and value. He believes that both conceptual esthetics and formal esthetics are equally fundamental to curatorial research. For him curating is and will always be a collaborative effort. Recently he has started to question the issues and empirical impossibilities raised by the democratic ideal, linking this political theory to the art field and to his curatorial and editorial practice.
Jean-Michel Ross is a Montreal based curator, critic, writer and collector. He completed an art history degree at Université du Québec à Montreal in 2004. He was assistant editor of Espace Sculpture Magazine for six years where he directed several thematic issues. His writings on contemporary art have been published regularly in Espace and C Magazine. In 2010 he curated the exhibition and residency project La Colonie, Deschambault-Grondine, Canada. In recent years he has also acted as co-curator for projects such as The Waterpod Project in 2009, New York; Québec Gold in 2008, Reims, France; and Jumelages in 2007, Montreal, Canada. He is the founder of Free Pass and has been on the board of Optica Gallery in Montreal since 2004.
Events & Exhibitions
Salon: Kakyoung Lee and Jean-Michel Ross
January 24, 2012
Jean-Michel Ross, Press Pass Maquette, 2011
Residents from Canada
Past Resident2012: Pollock-Krasner Foundation
Kakyoung Lee
Kakyoung Lee’s moving images are focused on the repetitive nature of personal daily life. The monotonous daily ritual is deconstructed and reconstructed in a fresh configuration in which nothing is the same and all things are in continuous flux. Lee combines hundreds of hand drawn images and prints to construct a moving image that reflects the sequence of activities in ordinary life and alludes to her search for her identity in the different geographic and cultural milieus through which she has passed in the travels between her two home countries, South Korea and the United States.
Kakyoung Lee (born 1975) works with moving images, prints, drawings, and installations. She received a BFA from Hong‐Ik University, Seoul, and a MFA from Purchase College, NY. Lee has exhibited widely in Korea and the United States including the Drawing Center; the Lower East Side Print Shop; the Queens Museum; the Museum of Modern Art, New York; and the Seoul Arts Center. Lee has participated in residencies at the Marie Walsh Sharpe Space Program, Brooklyn; Yaddo, Saratoga Springs; the MacDowell Colony, Peterborough, NH; the Lower East Side Printshop, New York; and the Jamaica Center for Arts & Learning, New York. Lee is a recipient of awards from the Pollock Krasner Foundation Grant (2010), the Korea Arts Foundation of America Award for Visual Arts (2010), and the AHL Foundation Award in New York (2009). Lee’s works are in the public collections of the Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, and Library of Congress, Washington D.C., among others.
Events & Exhibitions
Salon: Kakyoung Lee and Jean-Michel Ross
January 24, 2012
Kakyoung Lee, Jamaica Station - 1110, 2011, HD moving image, graphite on paper, B/W, and sound, 0:46 min. Courtesy of the artist
Kakyoung Lee, Walk - 2010, 2010 , HD moving image, 198 prints, drypoint on Hahenmuhle copperplate, bright white, B/W, and sound, 1:00 min. Courtesy of the artist
Kakyoung Lee, Grand Central - 0211, 2011, HD video, color, and sound, 3:27 min. Courtesy of the artist
Kakyoung Lee, Days in New York - Horizontal, 2011 , 5 channel HD moving image, graphite on paper, B/W, and sound, 1:40 min. Courtesy of the artist
Kakyoung Lee, Untitled - Grand Army Plaza.Brooklyn.NY.03.09., 2009, HD moving image, 156 Prints, B/W, and sound, 0:37 min. Courtesy of the artist
