BREATHLESS CURRENT
A LIFE WITHOUT LIFE
CREATIVE
Chung Jiwon
YEAR
04/03/2023
Breathless Current is not merely a physical flow of water. It is a silent force, carrying an invisible weight, appearing motionless yet never truly ceasing - a presence that lingers yet evades perception. In an era shaped by industrialization, the ocean is no longer a realm of pure natural circulation. It has transformed into a space where artificial remnants drift endlessly within oxygen - deprived currents, where mutated life adapts to an environment it was never meant to inhabit, and where the marks of human presence have reshaped ecosystems in ways never intended.
This transformation of nature is central to Mechanical Nature, which does not depict traditional nature but rather a new, industrially processed form of nature. This is not an ecosystem shaped by organic processes alone, but a landscape where human-made remnants have fused into the environment, forming a hybrid existence where artificial and natural elements can no longer be separated.
However, this mechanical nature is not merely a collection of cold, rigid machinery or artificial structures. It is a paradoxical entity - an evolving system where technology and industry have seeped into the fabric of life itself, where nature no longer exists in its original form, but as a fusion of organic and artificial survival mechanisms.
This exhibition explores a world caught in contradiction - where stagnation and movement coexist, where life and decay intertwine, where permanence and disappearance exist simultaneously. It visualizes the tension between natural rhythms and artificial disruptions, urging us to question the equilibrium we have disturbed.
Within this Breathless Current, what will we choose to see, and how will we respond.
It is an invitation to confront the consequences of human intervention - a meditation on the vanishing boundaries between nature and the synthetic, between survival and extinction, between what remains and what is lost.
Through striking visual contrasts and the unsettling beauty of mechanical nature, this exhibition serves as both a warning and a reflection of our time, prompting us to reconsider the future we are shaping. Will we embrace this evolving landscape as the new natural order, or will we see it as the final remnant of a world we once knew.