Current Exhibitions

Gary Hill: Momentombs

2019-11-26 ~ 2020-03-08

《Gary Hill: Momentombs》

I Believe It Is an Image in Light of the Other
1991-92
Collection du Musée d'art contemporain de la Haute-Vienne - Château de Rochechouart – France 

Suwon Museum of Art presents a solo exhibition of Gary Hill with selected works from 50 years of artistic practice from the 1970s, a time when video and performance were becoming established in contemporary art, to the present - when the significance of art's influence becomes more and more in question.

The exhibition is titled ‘Momentombs,’ which super imposes ‘moment,’ ‘momentum’ and ‘tomb’ alluding to a dynamic relationship with presence and the visceral nature of becoming all the while using the delimitation of "little deaths" that each manifestation must ultimately succumb to. Words and images are treated equally as materiality - meaning can turn on a dime, at times flipping to nonsense, questioning the very tenet of understanding itself. Images, words and sounds can join, separate and disperse in a blink of an eye or over an extended duration. As soon as an image and a word disappear, along comes another pair, emerging to replace them. However, those ‘momentarily’ vanished words and images are not completely dissolved. Instead they move to a ‘place’ – a tomb for instance – where they meet and spawn new meanings.

Born in 1951 in Santa Monica, California, Gary Hill began making sculpture at the age of 15 and upon moving to Woodstock, New York to attend the Art Student's League soon encountered the contemporary art scene. By chance, In 1973 he was shown a video porta-pak that profoundly influenced his direction. At first the intrinsic cybernetic process led to a kind of performance sculpture (Hole in the Wall, 1974) which would soon give way to language and the speaking body directly confronting the ephemerality of electronic media. Only surfing (Learning Curve, 1993; Learning Curve (still point), 1993; Isolation Tank, 2010-11) and psychotropic experiences (The Psychedelic Gedankenexperiment, 2010-11; Depth Charge, 2012) would be of equal influence. In his later work intertextuality comes to the fore with a more ontological focus opening up the interrelation between a work, its projection and relationship to the viewers' own projection, at times involving interactivity (Tall Ships, 1992; Withershins, 1995; HanD HearD, 1995-96; Viewer, 1996 among others). 

Although often mistakenly categorized as a "video artist," if labeling is necessary, Gary Hill is more aptly a language artist. Even when the literalness gives way to silence, the title itself resonates with the very nature of a given work. In Hill's oeuvre, language is not something in a fixed form and composed of predetermined words and pronunciations. It is open to endless change and enfolding. By reconciling language and image and through the process of loosening the bond between words and their signified meanings, Hill creates what many have described as ‘visual poetics,’ He changes our way of understanding a work of art, drawing attention to the dynamic space between work and viewer and suggesting that it is open space and free from any previous associations.

This exhibition Gary Hill: Momentombs will provide an opportunity to meet the fruits of Hill’s lifelong contemplation and practice of examining words and images, body and technology, virtual and real space, in a setting free of any interpretation.