From Ok-pop idol to CEO, exhibition places unlikely quartet behind digital camera

Installation view of Hyundai Card CEO Ted Chung’s photographic works, displayed as a part of the group exhibition, “Our [Moving] Images,” at Storage by Hyundai Card in Seoul / Courtesy of Hyundai Card

Hyundai Card CEO, creatives commerce polished personas for private snapshots in Seoul present

At Storage by Hyundai Card in Seoul, 4 people from markedly totally different worlds collect beneath one roof, sure by a single shared ardour: a deeply private devotion to images.

The group exhibition, titled “Our [Moving] Images,” brings collectively the visible practices of Hyundai Card CEO Ted Chung, style photographer Ahn Joo-young, singer-actor Kim Do-yeon and business director Ray Yi — figures whose skilled paths could differ, however whose pictures reveal a typical intuition to watch and protect the world by means of the lens.

Most of the works on view weren’t created for business ends. Instead, they learn extra like spontaneous traces of each day life — fragments of passing moments that emerged quietly between the calls for of profession and routine.

Rather than approaching the present searching for neatly outlined messages, guests could discover higher reward in merely transferring with its move, permitting the textures and sensibilities of every artist’s perspective to scrub over them.

To spotlight the distinct visible identities of its 4 contributors, the exhibition unfolds throughout Storage’s two exposed-brick flooring by means of a collection of color-themed areas, every dedicated to a single artist. Photographs differ in type, from framed prints to glowing mild bins and pictures suspended on fluttering material.

For Chung, images has lengthy been guided by a private philosophy of compositional precision, the place he “carefully arranges subjects on a proper plate.” His almost 20 images, spanning portraits and landscapes, typically exude that exacting sensibility.

Yet the present additionally reveals moments the place Chung intentionally pushes towards these instincts. At occasions, he mentioned, his disciplined method started to really feel nearly overly fixated on the act of taking images itself reasonably than on the medium’s spontaneity.

That shift first surfaced in a picture casually captured on a prepare desk whereas en path to an exhibition of German photographer Wolfgang Tillmans, an artist recognized for his free, unpretentious visible language. Inspired by Tillmans’ nonetheless lifes, Chung approached the shot with uncommon lightness.

For Kim, whose public life started in 2016 together with her debut as a part of the Ok-pop venture group I.O.I at a younger age, images turned tied to a interval of private reckoning.

Following the group’s disbandment, Kim discovered herself confronting questions of id, relationships and selfhood. As she progressively turned towards performing, images turned a method of navigating that transitional chapter.

Yi’s works equally supply glimpses past his skilled position as a business director, presenting pictures captured throughout Berlin, Hong Kong and New York that uncover refined wit and understated humor.

Meanwhile, style photographer Ahn’s part is putting for the inclusion of his uncommon private work: a black-and-white close-up portrait of actor Lee Sung-kyung, shot in 2013 earlier than she had absolutely risen to her present prominence.

In an business the place superstar portraits are sometimes polished to near-perfection, Ahn’s picture stands aside for its insistence on preserving pure texture. Fine facial hair and unfiltered particulars stay intact. The end result shouldn’t be an idealized star picture, however an intimate report of 1 individual.