Osang Gwon

Provenance: Directly from the artist

Seoul-based artist Osang Gwon (b.1974), who takes pictures of actual people and turns the pictures into three-dimensional objects, traverses the boundaries between photography and sculpture, 2-D and 3-D, illusion and reality, and readily occupies an un clear position in artistic genres.

The point of departure for his work early on was a desire to make “light sculpture.” Unlike traditional sculpture made mainly with heavy materials like bronze and marble, Gwon’s sculpture consists of photographic prints and a light interior structure used to maintain the form. For this reason, his work has been called “photo-sculpture.” In his more recent work Gibson, he continues to further develop this series also know as the Deodorant Type series that the artist began in the late 90s.

Gwon takes thousands of photographs of his subject from every possible angle, collaging and moulding them onto a compressed Styrofoam sculpture. Proportion, 3D mass and 2D photography give the sculptures verisimilitude. In appearance, it’s almost as if they’re contemporary cadavers mummified in the pastiched pages of magazines.

Through Gwon’s work, viewers can reinterpret and form new meanings based on their own experiences and question the boundaries of sculpture.

His work is included in major collections such as The National Museum of Modern an d Contemporary Art, Seoul Museum of Art, Korea, Busan Museum of Art, Korea, Poh ang Museum of Art, Gyeonggi Museum of Modern Art, Leeum, Sanmsung Museum o f Art, Burger Collection, Germany, David Roberts Art Foundation, United Kingdom, Si ngapore Art Museum, Singapore, Stat Oil, Norway.