Originality & Identity

Yeondoo Jung’s practice begins at the intersection of reality and fiction. In his early photographic work Hero(1998), he overlaid the pose of an action film star onto the everyday figure of a motorcycle delivery worker, revealing alternative possibilities latent within reality. In the subsequent 'Bewitched'(2001–) series and Wonderland(2004), he staged and visualized the dreams of ordinary individuals and children. Here, dreams are not mere fantasies but concrete perspectives that twist present life toward another direction. Through interviews and collaboration, Jung gathers the narratives of others and translates them into staged images, simultaneously revealing personal interiority and social conditions.
 
Evergreen Tower(2001) extends this interest into urban space. By photographing the living rooms of 32 households within identical apartment units, the series highlights the differences in individual lives that unfold within standardized structures. During this period, Jung concentrated on visualizing the social contexts surrounding individual lives through contrasts between dream and reality, ideal and everyday life. Reality, in his work, is treated not as fixed but as provisional—capable of shifting into another scene.
 
The 'Location' series and Documentary Nostalgia(2007), presented at “Artist of the Year 2007 – Jung Yeondoo”(National Museum of Contemporary Art, 2007), expand this inquiry further. The focus moves from individual dreams to the “stage” itself. Documentary Nostalgia exhibits a 70-minute single-take video alongside the filming equipment used to produce it, juxtaposing mechanisms of representation with physical space. Viewers move between the finished image and its production process, reconsidering the authenticity of the scenes they perceive.
 
Since the mid-2010s, Jung has turned toward macro narratives such as war, migration, and disaster. From Here and Elsewhere(2016) and Blind Perspective(2014) to A Girl in High Heels(2018), Noise Quartet(2019), and the recent One Hundred Years of Travels(2023), he reconstructs historical events through individual voices. This shift represents not a rupture but an expansion. While earlier works reflected society through personal dreams, more recent projects reread historical events through personal narratives. Fiction and staging remain central strategies, but their purpose lies in creating a space of empathy through which viewers may understand the lives of others.

Style & Contents

Although Jung majored in sculpture, he primarily developed his artistic language through photography. Yet for him, medium is not an end but a tool. In Boramae Dancehall(2001), photographic images were expanded into wallpaper-like patterns that transformed the exhibition space into a stage. In Documentary Nostalgia, video and installation merged, presenting the filming site itself as the artwork. Rather than remaining within a specific genre, Jung consistently selects forms that most effectively articulate his themes.
 
Staging is the central methodology that runs throughout his practice. In the 'Bewitched' series, identical compositions and poses place present and imagined futures side by side. In Location, artificial lighting and props introduce subtle ruptures into actual landscapes. In DMZ Theater Series – Dora Theater(2019), multiple photographs are layered to construct a single scene. In each case, staging serves to expose the constructed nature of reality. Rather than concealing manipulation, Jung reveals it, unsettling the viewer’s perception.
 
From the 2010s onward, his works increasingly combine multi-channel video, sound, performance, and stage-like installation. Classic and New(2018) interweaves the narratives of three individuals across three channels, while Noise Quartet structures four historical experiences through four-channel video and sound so that separate voices converge like an ensemble. In Blind Perspective, VR technology overlays ruins with pre-disaster landscapes, incorporating the viewer’s physical presence into the work.
 
These formal experiments culminate in One Hundred Years of Travels. The four-channel video installation—featuring staged performances of pansori, gidayū bunraku, and mariachi—alongside Generational Portraits, Wall of Blades, and Aria, brings video, sound, and sculptural installation into an organically connected exhibition structure. The spatial composition unfolds like an opera, with layered images and sound enveloping the viewer. The photographic tableau of his early career has expanded into a stage that encompasses the entire exhibition space.

Topography & Continuity

Although Jung began with photography, over the course of nearly three decades he has traversed documentary, performance, and installation, continuously exploring the boundary between fiction and reality. By combining staging with relational engagement, he has formed a distinctive artistic language. He does not merely create illusion; by exposing the mechanisms and processes behind representation, he embeds a critical awareness within his work.
 
His practice is fundamentally grounded in the process of building relationships. The collaborative approach that began with Bewitched extends through Here and Elsewhere, A Girl in High Heels, and One Hundred Years of Travels, gradually expanding into international contexts. Jung collects the stories of migrants, diasporic communities, and those marked by war, placing their voices on carefully constructed stages. Rather than speaking on behalf of his subjects, he designs structures in which multiple voices intersect.
 
Unlike media artists who focus primarily on technological innovation or spectacle, Jung employs technology as a mediator of relationships. VR and multi-channel video function not only as immersive devices but also as structural means of overlapping different times and spaces. In his practice, the expansion of medium is inseparable from the expansion of subject matter.
 
While his early works centered on individual dreams and later projects address social memory and historical movement, the underlying question remains constant: how can one imagine the life of another? His recent activities in overseas museums and international exhibitions extend this inquiry into broader contexts. Rooted consistently in relationship and empathy, his work engages specific local histories while prompting reflection on the contemporary condition of encountering the unfamiliar other.