“Brilliant Cut” Installation view at Gallery Baton ©Gallery BatonBrilliant Cuts, an exhibition featuring eight Korean and international artists, will run from July 12 to August 12 at Gallery Baton. The exhibition discusses one of the most frequently used methods in contemporary art: appropriation. The exhibition approaches the notion of appropriation from the standpoint of French philosopher Roland Bathes. Barthes regards the act of creation as a creative rearrangement of existing elements rather than creating something out of nothing. In this context, the exhibition suggests that there is the Gray Zone between the original source and appropriation.
The exhibition’s title, ‘Brilliant Cut’, refers to a method of manufacturing diamonds that creates a unique pentagonal shape to maximize light return. After manufacturing, diamonds have the same shape from any angle, and it is unclear where the shape begins and ends. It is connected to the concept of appropriation that the exhibition aims to address.
Some of the works by participating artists Heeseung Chung, Liam Gillick, Koen van den Broek, Andrew Sim, Tony Swain, Mitsuko Miwa, Charlotte Posenenske, and Jimok Choi are paired with each other to produce the effect of balance and tension. Posenenske’s sculptures and Miwa’s landscape paintings / Heeseung’s photographs, van den Broek’s urban street scenery paintings and Sim’s still lifes / Gillick’s grid-shaped installation, and Swain’s paintings create this effect.
In Brilliant Cuts, the viewer will sense the dynamic boundaries between the original and the appropriation.
