Hyong Nam Ahn
Video for Venice Biennale Architettura 2021
Artwork display at San Clemente Palace Kempinski, Venice
Artist Statement
Hyong Nam Ahn is a New Jersey-based Korean artist who makes poetic and lyrical sculptures and drawings to capture the vitality of the physical and spiritual world in the kinetic and ever-changing character of the environment. Ahn constantly searches for visual idioms capable of expressing this dynamic.
Hyong Nam Ahn uses various materials such as cut-out aluminum forms, stainless steel rods, wood, stone, and oil paint with environmental factors such as wind as metaphors that allude to the natural environment. Ahn's sensitivity to equilibrium, light, and movement is accentuated by his use of these disparate materials in a fluid dialogue with each other. The use of industrial materials such as neon lights combined with natural materials and motifs references our society's dichotomy that encompasses human-made and the natural rather than a critique on industrialization consumerism. The various elements seem fractured yet balanced, engaging the viewer into a sophisticated dialogue about philosophy, nature, progress, technology, and spirituality.
Hyong Nam Ahn considers himself a "space carver" as he sculpts his three-dimensional works by cutting the line of neon lights and metal panels in the space. Metaphorically, he travels through time and space by shaping the materials.
Creating Eve and Adam for San Clemente Palace Kempinski Venice, Ahn reflects the time and space we live in. As the entire world reset its clock and culture at the start of the pandemic, Ahn examines human beings' fundamental needs and concludes that every individual needs a relationship with another person to survive. Ahn shares his finding through a concept of Adam and Eve where the human relationships had begun. Eve and Adam visualize a 9 feet high female figure holding an apple in the right hand and AI(Artificial Intelligence) in her left hand. In contrast, a male figure is portrayed a lot smaller in size and a simplified form. Artist Ahn asks the viewers to question how to extend togetherness by contemplating society's emphasis on gender roles, human relationships in the technology-oriented world, the balance of ration and emotion, and the lineage of human nature.
Featured Artwork
Fish, 2020
Stainless steel, rock, metal
40H x 40W x 20D in
Jacob’s Ladder, 2017
Stainless steel, rock
74.8H x 13.78W x 17.7D in
Orange Bird, 2019
Stainless Steel, rock, aluminum board,metal, oil paint
32H x 34W x 24D in
Wild Goose, 2015
Stainless steel, rock, aluminum
23.6H x 31.5W x 23.6D in
The One, 2017
Stainless steel, rock, aluminum, neon
35.4H x 43.3W x 27.55D in