Lee Ufan Encounters
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LEE UFAN ENCOUNTERS Personal Structures Art Projects # 06 LEE UFAN LEE UFAN ENCOUNTERS This book is the documentation of Personal Structures Art Projects # 06. It has been published as a limited edition. The edition comprises 150 copies of ENCOUNTERS which 50 DeLuxe, numbered from 1 to 50, and 50 DeLuxe hors commerce, numbered from I to L. The 50 Standard copies are numbered from 51 to 100. Each item of this limited edition consists of a book and a DVD of two encoun- ters with Lee Ufan’s installation at the exhibition PERSONAL STRUCTURES as part of the Venice Biennale 2011 in a case, housed together in a cassette. The DeLuxe edition is stamped with a Japanese hanko stating Lee Ufan’s name and additionally contains a metal plate. This limited edition has been divided as follows: # 1-50: DeLuxe edition: Luïscius Antiquarian Booksellers, Netherlands # 51-100: Standard edition: Luïscius Antiquarian Booksellers, Netherlands HC I-L: Not for trade AP # 1-10: Lee Ufan © 2009-2012. Text by Lee Ufan, Karlyn De Jongh & Sarah Gold Photos by GlobalArtAffairs Foundation All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechan- ical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without permission of the editor. Concept by Rene Rietmeyer, Karlyn De Jongh & Sarah Gold Design by Lee Ufan, Karlyn De Jongh & Sarah Gold Printed and bound under the direction of Andreas Krüger, Germany Production in cooperation with Christien Bakx, www.luiscius.com Published by GlobalArtAffairs Foundation, www.globalartaffairs.org KARLYN DE JONGH SARAH GOLD 28 JUNE – 30 JUNE 2007 VENICE, ITALY SARAH GOLD In the late afternoon of Thursday 28 June 2007 we arrived in Venice. This was the first time that I visited this city, and the tranquil,romantic feeling is immediately present, when I think about this day. The Dutch artist Rene Rietmeyer, initiator of the project PERSONAL STRUCTURES, and I would have an appointment on the island next to Venice, Murano, the next morning. Due to a previous meeting on an art fair in Austria, I had established contact to the owner of a glass factory, who had invited Rene to speak about a possible cooperation. For most of our two days in Venice, we were occupied in meetings, no time to see the city or visit the Biennale itself. But sometime in those two days I think I have had my first encounter with Lee Ufan. I cannot recall the time or place, but I do believe to remember seeing the poster of his Biennale exhibition. Showing a large white canvas with a ‘dark square’, a boulder in front of the painting. Did the poster really look like that? Or did I imagine it all… In hindsight I believe that this was the first time I met Lee Ufan. Little did I know that 5 years later I would be writing about this first encounter. 7 11 SEPTEMBER 2007 VENICE, ITALY KARLYN DE JONGH My first encounter with Lee Ufan is also the first time I saw Venice. It was on Tuesday 11 September 2007. I had just graduated in art history the week before and a few days later, my internship at the German Pavilion of the Venice Biennale would start. For me at that time, it felt like a fresh start, a ‘new’ life. I felt ‘future’. For budget reasons, I had taken the slow, indirect way to Venice and arrived at the Santa Lucia train station in the late afternoon. When leaving the train station, I saw Venice for the first time: the typical buildings, the Grand Canal, the boats and right in front of my face a large banner with LEE UFAN. I know Sarah has just described this banner differently, but in my memory the banner had a red Biennale stamp on it, and for the rest it was just white with big, black letters saying “Lee Ufan”. At that time, the name looked strange to me, maybe that was partly because of the large surface and this short name. It looked interesting and it made me curious about this artist and his exhibition. At University, there had been lectures on Mono-ha [‘school of things’]. I knew about Nobuo Sekine. But Lee Ufan? Maybe my professor had told me about him, but it did not stay. Until that moment, I had never heard of the name “Lee Ufan” before. 9 In the weeks after, I passed this banner several times with the OctOBER 2007 vaporetto [water bus] and each time it was intriguing, this large surface with this short name. Honestly, I do not remember GIARDINI, VENICE, ITALY whether I ever went to see the exhibition at the Palazzo Palumbo Fossati. Probably, I did not, because otherwise I would have KARLYN DE JONGH remembered. In any case, this image of Venice, with Lee Ufan’s name in huge letters in the center, was in my memory for a long time and will now stay with me, because of this book. My internship at the Biennale was like a two-month holiday in Venice. I worked 24 hours a week and the rest of the time I went sightseeing. Working in Italy, I became acquainted with the ‘lunch break’. In my case, it meant an hour of time in which I did not have to be at the German pavilion. At that time, I did not have much else to do, so, besides eating a quick sandwich, I used this hour for seeing some of the other pavilions in the Giardini. One time, I do not remember the exact date, but it was in October, I went to the little bookshop next to the entrance. I love books and the small space was packed with piles of catalogues and other publications about art. In the midst of all these piles, I saw a simple, grey colored cover with a red Biennale logo on it. Somehow it stood out. LEE UFAN. I recognized the name from the banner in front of the train station. Flipping the pages in this book, I saw his work for the first time and was immediately drawn to it, especiallybecause of its simplicity. I liked it a lot. For me at that moment, it was special. Although I did not know anything about him yet, I had the feeling he would fit in the project PERSONAL Structures: TIME ∙ Space ∙ EXISTENCE, a project initiated by the Dutch artist Rene Rietmeyer. I was not actively involved in this project myself at that time yet, but 11 having co-curated the symposium TIME in Amsterdam together THE YEAR 2008 with Sarah a few months prior in June 2007, I felt close to it. Whether or not Rene and Sarah wanted to include Lee Ufan in PERSONAL SARAH GOLD STRUCTURES or not, I wanted to know more about his work. But I had no money. The book was 40 Euro and way too expensive for me at that time. Instead, I wrote down his name hoping I would find some information on internet and left the shop. In 2006 we had started PERSONAL Structures: TIME ∙ Space ∙ EXISTENCE, for which we cooperated with artists such as Roman Opalka, Joseph Kosuth and Lawrence Weiner. The project was planned as an ongoing platform and we were constantly looking for new artists to participate in our symposia, exhibitions and publications. Eventually in 2008 we had the opportunity to conduct a written interview with Lee Ufan. The questions were in English and we received Lee Ufan’s answers in Japanese. I remember that they had to be painstakingly translated. With the help of the Japanese artist Yuko Sakurai, working together with the comprehension of Rene Rietmeyer, it became a readable text after many hours of hard work. At the time we were in Miami, and the thoughtful, sensitive views of Lee Ufan did not coincide with the superficial American way you find in South Beach. 13 1 – 15 JANUARY 2009 DUBLIN, IRELAND KARLYN DE JONGH One year after first hearing about Lee Ufan, I was scheduled for an interview with him at his studio in Paris. For about a year now, I was actively involved in PERSONAL STRUCTURES and my life had developed rapidly. In 2008, we had organized a symposium about EXISTENCE in Tokyo, several exhibitions in Miami and had traveled throughout Europe. Most of that year’s winter I stayed in Dublin, to focus on my project ON KAWARA: UNANSWERED QUESTIONS as well as on preparing interviews for the publication PERSONAL STRUCTURES: TIME ∙ SpaCE ∙ EXISTENCE that we were working on. This book would include interviews with Tatsuo Miyajima, Christian Boltanski, Peter Halley, Giuseppe Penone and several others, including Lee Ufan. At University I had already learned about these artists; now I could meet them and ask any question I wanted. What a chance! Peter Lodermeyer, the Art Historian who was the main writer for this publication, had already done a fax-interview with Lee Ufan before. Now, he was welcome in Paris for a personal meeting with Lee Ufan and took me along with him. It was my third ‘live’ interview. In order to prepare questions, I had received a first translation of this fax-interview with Lee Ufan. It was really only a draft and 15 not easy to read. I was told that Lee Ufan was very difficult to various search options, but it was not a big success: apart from understand, but this text… At that time, I could not make much the usual sum of solo and group exhibitions, I found only one sense of it.