Impianto
2018
Marble, permanent installation
Impiantio (ital. for implant) is a serial work which Lee installed site-specifically on various buildings. Lee interferes directly with the given architecture, especially with the facades of buildings by filling in the blanks or replacing missing parts with marble that is considered a traditional and valuable material. Herewith, Lee highlights the blank space and equally refers to its time and story – an intended revaluation. Lee’s work relates to the traditional culture of restoration, which is the retrieval and recovery of an ancient cultural asset. For this body of work, Lee was inspired by her stay in Florence at the Villa Romana residency, during which she got the chance to observe and study a culture and society that emphasizes and cultivates the preservation and revitalization of the past. In Impiantio, Lee questions the value system and the meaning of restoration work.
Jeewi Lee
Jeewi Le was born in 1987, in Seoul. She works with performative and daily occurrences, which come into view as traces and serve Lee as painterly elements. For Lee, traces concurrently indicate movement (in urban as well as in exhibition spaces) and the reflection of the production process. In her work, Lee looks into and highlights social and historical events that have been burnt into various materials. Lee studied painting at Universität der Künste, Berlin and Hunter College University, New York.