Page 58 - "he 2020 Guggenheim issue of World of Art Contemporary Art Magazine

11TH BERLIN BIENNALE C/O
KW INSTITUTE FOR CONTEMPORARY ART

KW Institute for Contemporary Art is institutionally supported by the Senate Department for Culture and Europe. The
program of KW is kindly supported by the KW Freunde e. V. The images represent a selection 11th Berlin Biennale,
5.9.–1.11.2020. Photo: Silke Briel

Since its inception in the early 1990s, KW Institute for Contemporary
Art has devoted itself to the central questions of our times through
the production, presentation, and dissemination of contemporary
art. The Berlin Biennale for Contemporary Art, which was launched
soon after, emerged from a pressing desire for an extensive
dialogue with the international discourse around contemporary art.
In addition to other venues across the city the Berlin Biennale has
been working with KW’s exhibition space since it’s inauguration.

Numerous outstanding artists and internationally renowned
curators have since realized important new works and exhibition
projects there, establishing the two institutions located under
the roof of KUNST-WERKE BERLIN e. V. as vibrant venues for
progressive artistic practices, both within the Berlin art scene and
internationally.

YOUNG-JUN TAK

Young-jun Tak, Chained, 2020. Resin, fiberglass, paper, glue. Installation view, 11th Berlin Biennale, KW
Institute for Contemporary Art, 5.9.–1.11.2020. Courtesy Young-jun Tak. Photo: Silke Briel

As one of the most ancient responses to fear, religion is again
being ideologically instrumentalized to feed the populist demand
for scapegoating and expedite political polarization. Young-jun Tak
analyses the moral mechanizations of societies that are currently
echoing each other throughout the world by targeting LGBTQI
communities. In the artist’s home country of South Korea, Christian
leaders and mega churches have risen to dominance in the fields
of politics, economics, and journalism, despite the fact that the
majority of the population is non-religious. Driven by a belief in “the
blessed country” these religious groups direct their patriotic energy
towards promoting anti-LGBTQI and anti-migration sentiment and
decrying the country’s rapidly shrinking population. In a newly
commissioned work developed shortly before the outbreak of
the Covid-19 pandemic, Young-jun Tak draws on the way South
Korean Christian fanatics try to block the annual Pride parades by
throwing themselves on the ground and forming a human chain by
interlocking arms. Chained (2020) consists of ten life-sized statues
of the crucifixion, fabricated in Italy, which are installed in a circle
on the ground, their arms overlapping. A closer look reveals that the
surfaces of the figures are collaged with anti-LGBTQI ... (excerpt)

58 WORLD of ART