35 blue plexiglass pieces of different size, 1 light box, 5 florescent lamps
Dimensions variable
Drawing on previous works by Won Ju Lim, Blue 1 is typical of the artist’s play with post-minimalist sculpture and modernist architectural tropes, with its use of translucent and colored Plexiglas units of different sizes stacked up in boxlike shapes to assemble model-scale “buildings” in futuristic cityscapes. Here a light box illuminates the blue tone of the sculpture from the bottom to top and the inside out. The light reflects itself through several layers of Plexiglas; creating some entirely new visual effects that make the work seem to be lit up from within. The light appears at first to be very white, almost harsh, to then turn into a much softer tone of blue, while the outside edge of the sculpture displays a rich, dark indigo hue. Unlike many of the artist’s previous works for which she often lit the piece from the outside by using for example simple IKEA lamps, sometimes adding slide projections, Blue 1 offers a more ghostlike quality by being illuminated from within, as if some supernatural force was lurking beneath the somber blue construction to appear in all its glory to the viewer, not unlike some kind of medieval miracle apparition. Or perhaps more accurately, it may also reflect the artist’s interest in the creation of a baroque space within a piece of sculpture, in which alternate views of the interior and the exterior of the piece create an inability for the viewer to apprehend the whole sculpture at a single glance. Rather, one should circle around and try to comprehend its structure through a peripatetic circuit in the exhibition space to experience different points of views. The artificial materiality of the construction, as well as the dramatic setting of the large-scale piece, with its magical use of the light box, creating its own powerful glowing space within the reassuringly familiar wall of the gallery, underline that supernatural aspect. That kind of magic naturally derives from Lim’s interest in popular representations of urban and suburban architecture, Blue 1 being one of a series of three monochromatic pieces named after colors such as Ruby and Emerald, made to document the first apparition of a colored cityscape in the American movie classic "The Wizard of Oz", in which the main characters wake up to discover the Emerald City wherein resides the famed wizard. Here the chosen color is blue, often quoted as humankind’s most favorite color; reminiscent of oceans, flows, rivers, popularly referred to as the sky’s color at its utmost perfection. Text: Noellie Roussel
*1968 Gwangju, South Corea