Artist Profiles > K > Kim Beom
Kim Beom (b. 1963, Seoul) is a multi-disciplinary artist, who is currently living and working in Seoul. Comical and tender, his visual language is characterised by deadpan humour and absurdist propositions, playfully and subversively inverting expectations of our daily life. Through an expansive practice that spans from drawing, sculpture, video, installations, to artist books, the artist contemplates a world in which perception is radically questioned.
His explorations at STPI have led him to develop a series of lithographs; cyanotype and Vandyke prints of architectural drawings and found video footage; collaged tiles with stenciled figurative imagery; as well as paper pulp sculptures. Their unambiguous appearances belie the playful twists-and-turns that point to his preoccupation with the instability of representation, questioning the reality and fiction of the “image” through humour. These works were shown in his solo exhibition in STPI, titled Kim Beom: Random Life (2017).
Kim’s notable, recent exhibitions include Two Hours, Tina Kim Gallery, New York (2016); Tireless Refrain, Nam June Paik Art Center, Korea (2013); (Im)Possible Landscape, PLATEAU, Samsung Museum of Art, Seoul (2013); Kim Beom: The School of Inversion, Hayward Gallery, London (2012); Tell me, Tell me: Australian and Korean Art 1976-2011, Museum of Contemporary Art, Sydney (2011); Objects Being Taught They Are Nothing But Tools, The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, (2010); Your Bright Future: 12 Contemporary Artists from Korea, Los Angeles County Museum of Art, Los Angeles (2009); The Demon of Comparisons, Stedelijk Museum Bureau, Amsterdam (2009); and The Cover of a Book is the Beginning of a Journey, Arnolfini, Bristol (2008).
The artist’s international biennale participations include Sharjah Biennial (2015); California Pacific Triennial (2013); Gwangju Biennale (2012); Media City Seoul (2010); 51st Venice Biennale, Venice (2005); 8th Istanbul Biennale (2003); and the Taipei Biennial (1998).
Kim’s works are in the prestigious collections of the Museum of Fine Arts, Houston; the Cleveland Museum of Art; and the Walker Art Center, Minneapolis; the Museum für Kommunikation, Bern; Seoul Museum of Art; the Ho-Am Art Museum, Seoul; and the National Museum of Modern and Contemporary Art, Gwachun, Korea.