From the Amphitheater series, Satyr and Hermaphrodite, 2016 Image Credit: Courtesy of Park Kipyung

The history of classical antiquity is punctuated by the warriors and values and epic fighting to serve the larger good of the cosmos. The contradictions and paradoxes of the Greek and Roman myths that inspired the arts and creativity of its times continue to stand tall enough to influence the works of contemporary artists. Kipyung too draws inspiration from these myths and engravers for his sculptures. He explains further, “The work so far has been attempting to objectify and mythize myself by combining images of classical art with my own body. The Amphitheater series (2016) borrow images from sculptures and engravings of Uffizi Wrestlers, Hercules, Christoffel Jegher, Ecstasy of Saint Teresa, and Gin Lorenzo Bernini. I want my fake relics to be self-identifying and alive in the future, not as a tool for communication or a work of art that expresses something. Clearing the subjective traces in colour and form is a condition to get there.”

Closer Shot of Uffizi Wrestlers, 2016 Image Credit: Courtesy of Park Kipyung

Even if the Greek men won glory at the battlefields, the victory was more about the introspection rather than the celebration. Few of Kipyung’s sculptures in the shape of the hollow human forms engaged in the battle at once debunk the idea of winning the battle, rather indicating the futility around it. Along with these thematic traces of existential crisis, the sculptures abide by the constructive rules of measurements. To emphasise this, Kipyung says, “By borrowing as a formative language, I would like to emphasise the artificial sublime in my work and build my personal experience as a myth for posterity. The Amphitheater was produced by combining the side of the body without character, by using the law of frontality of Egyptian relief in reverse. The figure sculpture that created only two sides does not make the interpretation of it ½ + ½ = 1, but makes ½ + ½ = 0 so that it makes it impossible to understand and makes the reality of itself no longer real.”

From the Amphitheater series, Hercules, 2016 Image Credit: Courtesy of Park Kipyung

When art and politics are in sync with the zeitgeist, Kipyung’s sculptures touch upon the importance of the aesthetic and political ways of looking at a life, where human life falls short of perfections but rises to strike back.