2021 Taewha River Eco Festival
Taewhagang National Garden
Oct. 14. 2021 - Nov. 7. 2021

The artist accepts ‘home’ as an abstract concept that’s based on the repeated action of entering and exiting. For this work, the artist presents a 25m wide circle on a patch of grass at the Migratory Bird Park, made of approximately 400 return balls tied to a two meter rope. Return balls, obviously, return to their original place no matter what, and they are used here to visualize the artist’s understanding that ‘home’ is a result of habits. The balls serve two purposes: to physically mark a separation between the outside and the installation work, and to function as a bundle of small movable objects as viewers approach closer. Viewers are invited and encouraged to randomly interact with the artwork and in turn generate movements through their actions. Return balls each return in their own different ways, and the circular space within constantly changes its shape, suggesting that the space you leave behind at home not only transforms to reflect yourself but also goes through multiple layers of simultaneous shifts and changes. And from here, images of fragmentized individuals, along with the meaning of ‘home’ that’s defined by common categories such as time, place and age, are revealed.

<Habitual> is a performance that is an extension of Inbai Kim’s work, <I Always Return to the Other Place>. Performer Jae Sung Choi uses a return ball with his racquet for 30 minutes at a fixed place. The performer has been training for a long time as a tennis player, and the repetitive training that he has undergone is related to habit, which affects the performance in various ways. When using a return ball, the movement of the ball in and out indicates a situation in which a person enters and exits the house. Numerous repetitions of ‘going out and coming in’, the tennis player’s use of the return ball, and the tennis function resulting from the player’s repeated training are expressed as overlapping while the performance continues. The function of the return ball and the tennis player’s use of it are partially excerpted from the memories of each individual’s training in and out of the house, showing the process of forming the concept of the artist.

Another point to note in this performance is the characteristics of the movement of the return ball. The return ball goes out and comes back, but it’s difficult to get it back to the exact same position. This characteristic of the tool represents the physical uncertainty of the ideal entity for home.