LONDON — The Turbine Hall at Tate Modern recently became home to a grotesque organism that will continue to evolve for five months. Gobs of pink flesh hang by chains from the venue’s five-story-high ceiling, growing in number to eventually reach 152 by the end.
These “skins” were made by a large, motorized turbine that slowly rotates at the center of the 3,300-square-meter (35,520-square-foot) space. Acting as the "heart," the "guts" wrap around the turbine to pump out questionable pink liquid, dyeing new skins that will later be dried on racks and added to the flesh collection.
Mire Lee, the 36-year-old artist behind this kinetic installation, calls it, “Open Wound.”
Lee is the first Korean artist to exhibit their work at the venue, and this is her first institutional show in the country. She was selected as the ninth artist for the Hyundai Commission, an ongoing partnership between Tate and Hyundai Motor that highlights a single artist each year in a solo exhibition.
Previously featured artists include the likes of Philippe Parreno, Superflex, Anicka Yi and El Anatsui.
“'Open Wound’ is about how artists want to change the world with art, but they can’t, and that feeling of lethargy is the wound, which stays open,” Lee told reporters at Tate earlier this month. “It’s a metaphor, meaning that pain will always accompany you. But it’s better to have the wound open than have nothing at all.”
Currently, there are about 100 of these skins, which are made of a mesh material used in construction sites. This nauseating process of growing new skin is made possible through a dense pink glaze, made from cherry juice, which drips from the guts, or silicone hoses, creating a soppy soundscape.
Dozens more skins are assembled in the back, awaiting their turn to be dyed pink.
Emphasizing the performative layers more than the result isn’t a new feature when it comes to Lee’s work. At the 59th Venice Biennale, she presented “Endless House: Holes and Drips” (2022), a gory kinetic sculpture comprised of skeletal ceramics on scaffolds, smeared in a blood-like glaze over the course of seven months, which was then hardened together permanently.
“My Venice work was about things that are so open, where inside is out, and had so many holes with no protection around it,” Lee said. “But for this piece, I liked to imagine when you’re so open you don’t have to protect yourself. I wanted the turbine to be a central organ and for the work to disappear into the interior of the Turbine Hall.”
Lee’s first impression of the Turbine Hall was that it was very intense and overwhelmingly huge. So, she intended “Open Wound” to be designed as a “lonely small island,” meaning that it would blend well into the Turbine Hall without imposing too much on the space itself.
She took many inspirations from the characteristics and history of the Turbine Hall, which used to house the electricity generators of the former Bankside Power Station that is now Tate Modern. She initially wanted to revive a decommissioned turbine but later had to switch plans, eventually creating one herself. Lee even incorporated the power plant’s now-defunct crane into the installation.
The hanging of skin-like parchments from the ceiling in “Open Wound” is also an homage toward actual coal miners’ changing rooms in the Industrial Age. During this period, miners put their clean clothes into baskets and hoisted them up to the ceiling on pulleys as a way to save room in the cramped space.
“Open Wound” references the idea of shedding pain and trauma from the Industrial Age, a history embedded in the Turbine Hall. It’s the act of embracing such agony, instead of feeling threatened by it, Lee says, that viscerally evokes human compassion.
“For me, a beautiful experience was always based on the feelings of heartbreak,” Lee said. “It moves the heart when we all go through the same sufferings. You can never forget something like that.”
—Shin Min-Hee
