Ellie Kyungran Heo is an artist who explores socio-ecological solidarity, conflict and coexistence through time-based media (primarily film) and inter-/transdisciplinary research.
Heo’s artistic practice includes the following:
- Filmic encounters based on Emmanuel Levinas’s philosophy of interfacing with the Other,
- Self-reflective interpretations in the space where sound and image collide,
- Allusive storytelling inspired by Georges Perec’s Life: A User’s Manual,
- Filmic encounters based on Emmanuel Levinas’s philosophy of interfacing with the Other,
- Self-reflective interpretations in the space where sound and image collide,
- Allusive storytelling inspired by Georges Perec’s Life: A User’s Manual,
- Perspective shifts at the intersection between botany and art,
- Imaginative associations that apply Adam Smith’s theory of moral sentiments to non-human subjects,
- Cross-sensorial settings that amplify awareness of more-than-human beings; and
- Discourses on a garden for plants and a garden for all through cinematic observation, meditation and imagination.
- Imaginative associations that apply Adam Smith’s theory of moral sentiments to non-human subjects,
- Cross-sensorial settings that amplify awareness of more-than-human beings; and
- Discourses on a garden for plants and a garden for all through cinematic observation, meditation and imagination.
Following graduation from the Royal College of Art in London (2015), Heo has exhibited and screened her work widely, including at the Contemporary Art Biennial Sesc_Videobrasil, São Paulo; National Museum of Modern and Contemporary Art, Seoul; Jule Collins Smith Museum of Fine Art, Alabama; Total Museum of Contemporary Art, Seoul; Whitechapel Gallery, London; LUX Moving Image, London; Jan van Eyck Academie, Maastricht; and e-flux Video & Film, New York.
Heo’s film works are distributed by LUX: https://lux.org.uk/artist/ellie-kyungran-heo.
Contact: ellie.kyungran@gmail.com
Excerpts from notes:
2023
Would it be possible to form a garden for plants and a garden for all beings?
Would it be possible to form a garden for plants and a garden for all beings?
2022
There is a space where the sea, land and sky merge; a space where all living beings share without borders and boundaries. Can an imaginary or ideal garden, perhaps the Garden of Eden, become a reality there?
2021
Falling Flowers are Flowers, too.
Falling Flowers are Flowers, too.
2020
Standing in the shadow of a tree in the cemetery and facing my vulnerability – my awareness of human fragility – I accept that the one I obsess over is not mine. Beings are not mine. I am not mine, either.
Empty myself. Emptiness. Something fills this void*. Resonance**.
Ineffable tenderness from the plants then descends upon me.
Standing in the shadow of a tree in the cemetery and facing my vulnerability – my awareness of human fragility – I accept that the one I obsess over is not mine. Beings are not mine. I am not mine, either.
Empty myself. Emptiness. Something fills this void*. Resonance**.
Ineffable tenderness from the plants then descends upon me.
* In Gravity and Grace (1952), Simone Weil says, ‘Grace fills empty spaces, but it can only enter where there is a void to receive it, and it is grace itself which makes this void’.
** In Listening (2007), Jean-Luc Nancy describes ‘resonance’ as the structure of a subject and of sense, which is the way of understanding the subject that ‘identifies itself by resonating from self to self, [...] one is the echo of the other, and this echo is like the very sound of its sense’.
** In Listening (2007), Jean-Luc Nancy describes ‘resonance’ as the structure of a subject and of sense, which is the way of understanding the subject that ‘identifies itself by resonating from self to self, [...] one is the echo of the other, and this echo is like the very sound of its sense’.
2018-2020
The law and common sense morality can help us to achieve a certain goodness in life, but there is a limit to how well one can live according simply to the rules. There is a passivity in this approach to living well. Can art take us further and help us to actively approach the honourable life as better beings?
The law and common sense morality can help us to achieve a certain goodness in life, but there is a limit to how well one can live according simply to the rules. There is a passivity in this approach to living well. Can art take us further and help us to actively approach the honourable life as better beings?
2017
'All' is in smAll.
'All' is in smAll.
2014-2015
The questioning of Being is an experience of Being in its strangeness. […] The question is itself a manifestation of the relationship with Being. Being is essentially alien and strikes against us. We undergo its suffocating embrace like the night, but it does not respond to us. […] And if it is more than this question, this is because it permits going beyond the question, and not because it answers it. What more there can be than the questioning of Being is not some truth, but good - Emmanuel Levinas, Existence & Existents
The questioning of Being is an experience of Being in its strangeness. […] The question is itself a manifestation of the relationship with Being. Being is essentially alien and strikes against us. We undergo its suffocating embrace like the night, but it does not respond to us. […] And if it is more than this question, this is because it permits going beyond the question, and not because it answers it. What more there can be than the questioning of Being is not some truth, but good - Emmanuel Levinas, Existence & Existents
Questioning other beings means paying attention to them. It is definitely good to go beyond being curious about others and opening up to otherness by seeking to understand oneself.
2011-2013
To see a world in a grain of sand, and a heaven in a wild flower.
Hold infinity in the palm of your hand, and eternity in an hour - William Blake
To see a world in a grain of sand, and a heaven in a wild flower.
Hold infinity in the palm of your hand, and eternity in an hour - William Blake
One tiny thing is an opening to the bigger world, a start to understanding the wider whole. In other words, the most precious moment could be a bridge to convey us towards the eternal. In sharing the breath of the moment, there is a movement towards breathing together in an unlimited space.
Selected online references and reviews: