Curated by Chiara Valci Mazzara, Co-curated by Hyein Park

The exhibition title, Sil(h)ence merges ‘silence’ and ‘hence’. It suggests silence as the starting point of the artistic process, a moment of meditation and introspection. Silence is sought as the response of the public, to initiate a meditative approach, as a moment fixed in time, a mirror to a deeper perception. This moment of introspection, recollection, perceived as suspended in time and meditation takes form through the photographic works as a sight within; it introduces the work of the Korean Photographer Chang-Won through an immersive experience, changing the way the viewer ‘enters’ the work by being reflected in it. Through the word ‚hence‘ the title un-discloses the consequence of this moment of recollection as a further development: a creative act based on a deeper self-reflection: literal and dynamic.The pieces have as subjects the masks realised in ceramic by the artist in his studio and later photographed. The masks emerge as floating objects reverberating the feeling of meditation and self-observation: mirroring the viewer.
In Woo Chang-Won works, the act of closing one’s eyes, staying still and silent is a gesture toward ‘emptiness’(공/KONG). Triggers an inward movement, towards a deeper understanding. The artist aims to create a space for the viewer to stand in front of his works and connect with oneself in which, through emptiness, one re-connects, self perceives. Being silent relates to the practice of „wall-gazing,“ one among the well known south-east Asian meditation methods in which, meditating, observing the absence of the self, one is enabled to explore one’s inner world, reaching a deeper perception of the self, of the surrounding and now of the exhibited pieces. It is a silent show…

With this exhibition, hosted by the Kunstverein, continues the loose series of presentations of artistic positions from Korea begun in 2019. A project funded by Alexander Tutsek – Stiftung