Artists in the 20th century began to pay attention to emotion, body, desire, the irrational and non-civic as part of the denial of the intellectual system based on the Western rationalism. The reinterpretation of the values that were in relatively low...
Artists in the 20th century began to pay attention to emotion, body, desire, the irrational and non-civic as part of the denial of the intellectual system based on the Western rationalism. The reinterpretation of the values that were in relatively low positions laid the foundation of the shift from vertical order to horizontal order, thereby symbolizing the recovery of the lost humanity. On the other hand, in contrast to traditional materials such as metals, stones, and wood, the usage of soft cloths, latexes, secretions of liquids from body, natural substance such as soil or grass, untouchable light lead to variable and indeterminate forms. Such morphological expressions are associated with touch and instinct, body and desire, and eroticism, which were hindered by rational reasoning and visual-centrism.
As a work of eroticism and ambivalence revealed in desire, this study described the manifestation of desire rooted in the unconscious, eroticism, and its ambivalence based of the theory of Sigmund Freud, Jacques Lacan, and Georges Bataille. Since the two-sided form of eroticism comes from the intrinsic tendency of humans, this study analyzed it in relation to eating, sex, and food and excrement. Moreover, based on the discussion of the structure of desire created in the consumer society, this study explored the influencing relations of desire of individuals as well as society and culture, and explained that desire which is never filled exists in the contexts.
The author of this study used soft materials such as cloths, latexes, and plants to express various media, including three-dimensional structure, installation, photography, and video image. Eroticism and ambivalence hidden in food, rubber balloons, children’s TV programs, and characters were visualized in soft materials as the forms associating remnants, genitalia, and organs. The way of overwrapping a variety of symbols signifying the sacred and subordinate, revealed the desire and eroticism suppressed by authoritative reason. This series of expressions deconstructed the vertical hierarchy between values with the aesthetic implications of postmodernism, liberation from taboos and freedom of desire.