Yona Lee

A REAR WINDOW PROJECT

Auckland-based artist Yona Lee is best known for her free-standing sculptural forms and installations that create dynamic relationships between the objects and the three-dimensional space that they inhabit. While Lee’s work is always site-specific, this is the first time that the artist has created a wall-based installation. The use of slatwalls, a material used to display products in a commercial setting, activates the Rear Window as a ‘showroom’. Typically, products are attached to the slatwall via large prongs; these can be layered for the most organised and efficient use of space.

Lee has manipulated and angled the panels of the slatwall to respond to the three window frames in the gallery space. The surface of the MDF is left raw, highlighting the contrast between the natural material and the hard steel structures that Lee has created. The precise machine-cut slats and Lee’s intuitively moulded steel adornments are juxtaposed – the shapes and lines of the objects move between sitting harmoniously within the horizontal lines of the walls and rebelling against them.

The objects are not permanent, they can be easily moved to another ‘hook’ if desired; examining ideas around improvisation, temporality, space and action. At the same time, Lee asks her audience to use their imaginations when considering and defining what the objects themselves are.