by RUTH KIM
In a world where the term “selfie” is ubiquitous, it’s easy to grow tired of the endless stream of self-promoting photos that flood your social media dashboard. But one South Korean artist and photographer is turning the word on its head. In his latest project, “99 Variations,” Youngho Kang is giving the self-portrait a whole new meaning.
Armed with a camera, a mirror and a whole lot of imagination, Kang is about halfway through capturing 99 versions of himself that are sometimes grotesque, often androgynous, and always captivating.
“I had to find what only I can do, the effort and concentration that only I can give,” Kang explained to KoreAm by email. And that’s exactly what he did for himself. Without a background in photography, he set the standard for commercial photography in South Korea and then took a 90 degree turn to tackle a different challenge—the fine arts.
Kang, born in 1970, initially launched his career photographing commercially. Taking photographs for companies the likes of Coca-Cola, Samsung, and LG, for over 80 film posters, and for fashion editorials, as well as taking portraits of famous Korean talents, Kang quickly rose to fame as an eminent, highly sought-after photographer. Of his recent works, one notable documentary-style project titled “Miss President” offers a unique perspective on South Korea’s first female leader through photographs that are shot behind the back of President Park, taken over a yearlong period before she was elected.
For Kang, “99 Variations” was a departure from commercial photography, but it’s something that he’s been passionate about for a while. Dissatisfied with the unimaginative, structured rules of the commercial world, Kang decided to experiment with fine art as an way to express himself and distinguish himself as an artist. “I wanted to emphasize the energy of art,” he said.
Energy is a key word for the South Korean artist, nicknamed “the dancing photographer.” Never idle on the set of a shoot, Kang is constantly in motion when he’s photographing a subject, dancing to music that’s playing in the background. “In my experience, good pictures always come when both the model and I forget that we’re working and we forget the situation around us,” said Kang. “So, being absorbed in the music is very efficient in helping us concentrate inside.”
In videos that document his process, like the one below, you’ll see Kang engrossed in the music, closing his eyes, moving to the rhythmic pulses, yelling passionately, and flitting across the room with his camera in hand. His colleagues call his photographic process a performance. Yet unlike a performance, the spontaneity of his technique arises not from careful and premeditated preparation, but out of a state of mind that we’re all familiar with—the daydream.
“My process and mind is very unreasonable and not-scientific—it’s like daydreaming,” explained Kang. “My attitude and thought process is very similar with what alchemists do. In fact, alchemic processes don’t have an exact goal. They just go without a plan or map. Me too. I constantly went inside myself, and then traced the pictures that were left after me, both qualitatively and quantitatively.”
And in what better medium to “trace” yourself than in a mirror? Kang naturally took to the mirror to execute his work because it allowed him to assume multiple roles in his photographic process.
“The mirror became the space where I am both the photographer and the actor on stage. In the mirror, my two different talents [as photographer and as actor] can be expressed, and I can discover my identity as well as that of my work,” said Kang. “The mirror was just a pragmatic choice of material for my unique way of work. So, the expression of ‘looking at myself’ would not be right for my case, but instead, ‘looking for—discovering—myself’ would be more accurate. Of course, the final output is visually bizarre, but I think my works are beyond the visual aspect. It’s much more conceptual.”
Kang never studied the technical theories of photography during his school years. A former French language and literature major at Hongkik University in Seoul, Kang instead looks to the liberal arts for conceptual inspiration, particularly noting the imagination theory of late nineteenth/mid-twentieth century French philosopher Gaston Bachelard. The influence of the liberal arts is transparent in the mythical and poetic quality of his photographs.
Using a new method that he calls “image-telling,” Kang titles each photo with literary, proverb-like phrases that, paired with the visually ambiguous nature of his photographs, leave room for interpretation for the viewer. Although Kang dictates some structure of a story in his photographs, “99 Variations” is essentially an open book in which spectators can fill their own stories. It’s all about interpretation and re-interpretation through imagination.
“Inside me, there are gods, men and women, and androgynous mutants. They co-exist with my present self, and ‘we’ are all interrelated,” wrote Kang in his artist statement for ’99 Variations’. “I brought a key, the camera, opened the door to the secret passage, the mirror, awakened my mythical archetypes, and lured them out into the world.”
These ‘mythical archetypes’, which take on male, female, and androgynous personas, are simultaneously one and the other with Kang. Like a dream that feels both familiar yet unfamiliar, these photographs capture someone whose identity is constantly in flux, a feeling that can hit home for many people.
“Frankly, with the works I have finished thus far, I looked at the photographic images and felt as if they were others, although I know that they are all images of me,” Kang further explained in his statement. “So it is possible to imagine the ‘others’ through my mirror-reflected images. I could be you or I could be he or she. I could be objectified as you and could be divided into him or her.”
Kang has already photographed nearly 50 images and released them back in 2009, and he wants to reach 99 photos to culminate the project. Why 99? “A total of 99.99 is a theoretical number that denotes my selves as a whole to be 100 minus one—‘my present self,’” explained the artist in the statement. “In terms of meaning, each one is one of my fragments and, together, they constructed the total me.”
“99 Variations,” which was recently highlighted on The Huffington Post, has received some negative feedback, according to Kang. “The professionals, like the art critics and curators of galleries, were very cold towards me. I think the reason behind their reaction to my work is because I do not come from a background in fine art, and because I used to be a commercial photographer,” he explained. “And in Korea, it is so difficult to be acknowledged as an artist who came from a commercial background.”
Taking this criticism with a grain of salt, Kang is moving forward with “99 Variations,” which recently was featured at the Central Slovakian Gallery from February to March 2014. The exhibit has previously showed at the House of Art in Slovakia in 2013, the Ballarat International FOTO Biennale in Australia in 2013, and the Sungkok Art Museum in Korea in 2009. At the latter, he paired the exhibit with an actual performance that demonstrated a refined version of the photographic process behind each photo.
And despite what the critics say, fans have been thrilled. “People in South Korea actually loved my work a lot,” Kang said. “They were quite open to it.”
To see more of “99 Variations,” click here. To view Youngho Kang’s official website, click here.
All photos courtesy Youngho Kang’s official website and the official website for ’99 Variations’.
