futuraseoul.org.en

Futura Seoul presents the first monographic exhibition in Asia of Anthony McCall (b. 1946), a pioneering artist who has explored light, time, space, and audience interaction throughout his career. This exhibition offers a comprehensive overview of McCall’s artistic trajectory spanning nearly half a century. Beginning with his early film and performance works such as Landscape for Fire(1972), created in the UK, the exhibition traces the evolution of his practice. It highlights the pivotal moment in 1973 with Line Describing a Cone, which marked the inception of his renowned Solid Light series. The survey continues through to his more recent installations, which have become increasingly sophisticated since the 2000s through the integration of digital technology. Together, these works map McCall’s sustained experimentation and conceptual inquiry into the possibilities of light, space, and time as artistic materials. Featured works include Traveling Wave(1972/2013), Breath III(2011), Circulation Figures(1972/2011), Between You and I(2006), and Skylight(2020), all of which reveal how McCall’s visual language has evolved, exploring volumetric forms and sculptural qualities across decades.

Emerging in the early 1970s in dialogue with the New York avant-garde film scene, McCall began by examining the physical and temporal nature of film as a medium. After a two-decade hiatus from 1979 to the early 2000s, he returned with a body of work that combined digital technology with meticulously constructed light-based installations. McCall has redefined cinema through what he calls expanded cinema, integrating elements of sculpture, drawing, and installation. By removing the screen and projecting light into space, he invites audiences to step into three-dimensional environments shaped by light and time. These immersive works allow audiences to move through and around sculptural volumes of light, experiencing their form and transformation over time. Audience participation has always been central to McCall’s practice. In Landscape for Fire, he explored the boundary between material and image; in the Solid Light series, he sculpts light itself. As audiences physically engage with the space, their presence alters and completes the work, generating a dynamic interplay between perception and response. McCall’s installations radically reimagine cinematic space and the experience of duration and movement.

His work resists simple classification. Oscillating between the physical and the intangible, stillness and motion, clarity and ambiguity, McCall creates what might be called “sculptures of time.” His practice has continuously evolved alongside technological shifts, yet remains grounded in a consistent philosophical inquiry. In an age where image-based art is increasingly immersive, McCall’s approach remains visionary and relevant. Rather than tracing a linear evolution, McCall’s oeuvre reveals a structure of recursiveness and variation. This exhibition foregrounds his enduring question—can light be sculpted beyond the image?—and shows how that question has been persistently and rigorously pursued over decades. In doing so, it presents McCall’s work as a future-facing lens through which we may reimagine the spatial and sensory contours of our time.

For over five decades, Anthony McCall has focused on the fundamental elements of cinema light and — time—exploring new sensory experiences through their interplay with space and movement. His work transcends traditional boundaries, creating immersive environments that redefine how audiences engage with art.

This archival space offers an intimate glimpse into McCall’s meticulous creative process. It features a rich collection of materials, including idea sketches, detailed notebooks, storyboards illustrating the temporal shifts in his Solid Light works, performance stills, exhibition views and posters from the 1970s.

Among these, McCall’s notebooks stand out as vital tools for organizing his artistic thoughts and documenting the genesis of his ideas. Spanning over 180 volumes, these notebooks contain diagrams, sketches, calculations, graphs, and maps—records that vividly capture the early stages of his installations and performances.

A particularly striking aspect of McCall’s practice is his precision in planning spatial and temporal structures. His performance scores resemble musical compositions, where mathematical calculations and temporal configurations are meticulously crafted. These scores not only reveal the spatial and temporal frameworks underpinning his works but also deepen audiences’ understanding of his innovative approach to art-making.

This sequence of seven footprint drawings, serves as the structural foundation for the vertical installation piece Breath (III), part of Anthony McCall’s renowned Solid Light series.

For McCall, drawing is not merely a preparatory step but a central element in the creation process. His Solid Light works, which explore dynamic forms within time and space, demand meticulous planning and simulation for precise realization. Drawing functions as a critical tool for visualizing and concretizing how linear beams of light expand and transform into geometric shapes within space, ultimately manifesting as sculptural forms. This process plays a pivotal role in determining both the final form of the artwork and the viewer’s experience.

The expansion and contraction of light forms evoke the sensation of breathing in and out. Observing this phenomenon inspired McCall to incorporate the concept of “breath” into his Solid Light work, and also to recognize the possibility that these simple geometric abstract forms like lines, waves and circles might, through the use of just image and motion, be able to describe other sensations of the corporeal.

This sound installation, first created in 1972 in the UK, exemplifies Anthony McCall’s minimalist approach while offering an immersive and physical experience to its audience, much like his solid light works that utilize light.

In the installation, dense waves of sound made — from white noise, but sounding unmistakenly like ocean waves—repeatedly roll through a 12-meter-long exhibition space, gradually gathering speed and volume before crashing explosively on the floor at one end.

These sound waves create an invisible yet palpable sculpture with a commanding presence. Five hemispherical speakers are arranged in a straight line along the gallery floor, allowing audiences to move freely within the space and distinctly perceive the motion of the waves. As McCall puts it, “the purely sonic wave can almost be seen traveling down the room.”

This configuration not only engages auditory perception but also stimulates visual and spatial awareness, reflecting McCall’s characteristic experimental approach.

The original tape for this work was lost, but is reconstructed in 2013 using five tracks and five speakers. This revival underscores McCall’s ongoing commitment to exploring sensory experiences through innovative mediums.

This is a documented outdoor performance that explores new possibilities at the boundary between natural landscapes and contemporary art through the primal medium of fire. This work became a pivotal starting point for Anthony McCall’s Solid Light series, which has continued from 1973 to the present.

Collaborating with the British artist group Exit, McCall orchestrates a sculptural choreography where small fires are ignited systematically across a field. The performance is guided by a meticulously planned score resembling a musical composition, which dictates the ignition sequence and timing of 36 small fires arranged in a 6 x 6 square grid. These flames evolve in response to shifts in time and space, creating a dynamic interplay between natural elements and human intervention.

As part of McCall’s Fire series, this work examines the ignition, extinction, and spatial transformation of fire from multiple perspectives. Landscape for Fire is an early work of McCall’s investigations into these themes, offering audiences a visually and sensorially immersive experience through the calculated progression of flames.

The piece also embodies both Minimalism and Conceptual Art. By combining elemental forces —fire, wind, earth— with the rigid structural formality of the grid, McCall creates a unique aesthetic environment that audiences can directly engage with. His precise use of scores to plan spatial coordinates and temporal sequences underscores the conceptual rigor behind his practice, revealing his commitment to crafting works that are both visually striking and intellectually profound.

McCall’s first films (all 16mm) were records of live performances outdoors. While he was editing Landscape for Fire he became increasingly interested in the discourses around avant-garde film, particularly admiring the films of Andy Warhol, Michael Snow and Paul Sharits. As he showed the completed film Landscape for Fire he became intrigued by the fact that the film was a second-hand version of the fire performance, when it was the performance itself that he considered the primary work of art. This realization set in motion a train of thought: rather than being a film of a performance, could a film be a performance in its own right? This led him, in mid-1973, to conceive Line Describing a Cone, which became the first of the Solid Light films.

His Solid Light was a film that encouraged the audience to turn their backs to the screen, looking instead at the beam of light coming from the projector. Ultimately, it was this cinematic problem that led McCall to explore “light” itself, and the light, in the way he was using it, lent itself to sculpture, to performance, and—underlying all three—to duration.

Anthony McCall’s 1972 performance-based installation in London marked a pivotal moment in experimental art. In this work, McCall transformed the space by adding a pair of giant mirrors facing one another, distributing torn-up newspapers across the floor and inviting photographers and filmmakers to simply document their own presence, creating a dialogue between the participants and their environment. In 2011, McCall reimagined this early performance as an installation, reconstructing the original setting and projecting archival footage onto a central screen.

Every 30 seconds, the footage alternates between frozen images accompanied by ambient sounds, such as camera shutters and footsteps on newspaper, and silent images of the participants in motion, at work. This cyclical structure of mirrors, newspapers, and repetitive imagery explores themes of documentation, circulation, and time while encouraging active audience engagement.

The participants in McCall’s original performance observed one another while continuously generating images —a process that not only examined the circulation and consumption of imagery but also seemed to anticipate today’s selfie culture and social media dynamics. Reflecting on this evolution, McCall noted that while the performance once appeared hallucinatory, it now feels strikingly familiar, highlighting shifts in how personal images are created and consumed. His work probes the essence of photography and film, as well as the interplay between history and the present.

Central to McCall’s artistic practice is the concept of “expanded cinema,” which he was instrumental in shaping during the avant-garde film movement of 1970s London and New York. As a member of the London Filmmakers Co-operative, he challenged traditional cinematic boundaries by integrating performance, installation, and audience participation into his works. His piece Circulation Figures exemplifies this experimental approach; its alternating patterns of motion and stillness create a unique rhythm that interrogates the flow of time and the stillness of moments.

McCall’s use of mirrors and projections extends spatial boundaries while expressing temporal dynamics—a hallmark of his Solid Light series. These works transform projected light into sculptural forms that occupy three-dimensional space, inviting audiences to interact physically with the artwork. The newspapers used in his installations evoke the era when public events were monopolized by mass media while private lives remained relatively hidden. In contrast, his 2011 reconstruction reflects a world transformed by digital technology and social media, where image circulation has become decentralized and pervasive.

This tension between past and present creates a layered viewing experience in McCall’s work. The newspapers serve as symbolic bridges connecting historical context with contemporary realities. His art not only revisits its origins but also adapts to new technological landscapes, making it both timeless and deeply relevant today.

For over five decades, Anthony McCall has redefined the boundaries of film and installation art, crafting a distinctive artistic language. To begin with, as an avant-garde filmmaker in the early 1970s, McCall adopted the concept of expanded cinema, which sought to transcend traditional cinematic forms. Through minimal light projections, he began creating sculptural forms that evolve in three-dimensional space over time.

Between You and I encapsulates McCall’s artistic exploration, offering an immersive experience that engages light, space, time, and audience interaction. In this piece, two vertical Solid Light forms are projected side by side from a height of 10.8 meters onto the floor below. Over a 32-minute cycle, these light forms gradually merge and transform, creating a dynamic interplay of shapes. By using light and time the fundamental elements — of cinema—McCall eliminates the screen entirely, projecting directly into space. This invites audiences not just to observe but to physically enter and become part of the artwork. Such participatory engagement positions McCall as a pioneer of immersive environments in contemporary installation art.

The concept of expanded cinema is further evident in how McCall integrates time and movement into his work. Audiences witness the gradual transformation of volumes of light in real-time, echoing cinema’s temporal narrative while focusing on spatial experience. By merging the cinematic emphasis on time with installation art’s focus on space, McCall creates an evolving spatial narrative—a “sculpture in time.”

As its title suggests, Between You and I delves into themes of interaction and relationships. The two solid light forms visually embody the exchange and adaptation inherent in human connections. Over time, they adopt and exchange each other’s traits, offering a poetic metaphor for interpersonal dynamics.

Skylight is one of the latest works in Anthony McCall’s renowned Solid Light series, which integrates light, space, time, and the audience’s experience to create a distinctive artistic encounter. Like his earlier work Between You and I, this piece relies solely on projected light, mist, and duration to propose a new interpretation of materiality. The beams of light evolve gradually, forming volumetric shapes that occupy three-dimensional space, a hallmark of McCall’s approach that treats light as a tangible, sculptural medium.

The installation is further enriched by an immersive soundscape composed by David Grubbs, whose audio evokes rumbling thunder and flashes of lightning resonating throughout the space, amplifying the sensory impact. As visitors move around the slowly shifting forms of light, they experience the work from multiple perspectives, embodying McCall’s belief that art should be physically and actively engaged with—a principle central to his practice.

Skyligh was first exhibited as a maquette in 2020 and is being shown at full scale for the first time at Futura Seoul in 2025.

Ugo Rondinone explores the fundamental and simple concept of the cycle of time in his work series sunrise. east.. This two-meter-high, massive silver aluminum sculptural head evokes various visual languages such as ritual masks, ghosts, comics, and emoticons, using diverse expressions to metaphorically represent human emotions like joy and adversity. Named from sunrise. east. january to sunrise. east. december, these sculptures represent each of the twelve months of the year, allowing viewers to reflect on the varied emotions experienced throughout the year.

Masks are a recurring motif in Rondinone's work, and the sunrise. east. series evokes totems of primitive cultures. When all twelve pieces are gathered, they bring to mind the circular monument of Stonehenge. His unique approach to connecting mythology and daily life shines through in this series, as he utilizes classical materials and techniques like clay and casting to reinterpret the cultural and art history of the past in a contemporary manner, presenting a distinctive and meditative visual language. Furthermore, Rondinone creates a dialogue between artificiality and naturalness, culture and society, and eternity and transience, exploring the relationship between life and art.

Nam June Paik's Flicker is one of his experimental media art pieces from the 1960s, combining light, electronic devices, and physical sensations to create a new audiovisual experience. The work uses the flicker effect, which involves periodic flashes of light to stimulate the viewer's vision and perception.

Flicker was created as part of Paik's exploration of the relationship between technology and humanity. It utilized analog television and lighting devices to produce a flickering effect that led viewers to experience visual illusions or psychological responses. The flicker effect interacts with brainwaves through light flashing at specific frequencies, allowing viewers to have a novel sensory experience.

This piece is a significant attempt to use media technology as an artistic tool, demonstrating the potential for technological devices to go beyond mere information delivery and actively stimulate human senses and consciousness. Nam June Paik played a pioneering role in media art, exploring the boundless possibilities of artistic expression through technology.

Philippe Parreno’s Marquee series is inspired by the dazzling light canopies of theater entrances. These canopies were particularly popular in the early to mid-20th century America, during the golden age of Hollywood, serving as billboards announcing the titles of films and the names of their stars. However, Parreno's marquees are stripped of all text, leaving only their shells, while the flickering, radiant halogen lights reveal a powerful presence.

For Parreno, the marquee acts as an element that intervenes in the exhibition space, introducing the possibility of an event. While it does not advertise a film screening, it still suggests the existence of cinema, transforming the exhibition space into a relic of Hollywood or Broadway scenery. This piece, which changes into an indicator, a label, or a naming device, acquires various meanings depending on the exhibition context and the viewer's imagination, inviting contemplation of the space and time beyond its luminous glow.

Anicka Yi (South Korean, b. 1971)

Wheel 1-3

UV print on silk screen mesh in cherry frame

148.6 x 118.1 cm

152.7 x 122.6 x 7.6 cm (framed)
2022

Anicka Yi (b. 1971) has expanded her work by engaging in dialogue with multiple machine learning models simultaneously. Initially, she used her own paintings as parameters, but later she combined various images, such as algae, bacteria, fungi, tissues and cells, plants and animals, machines and electronics, and geological landscapes, allowing each model to evolve independently. Yi conceptualized this process as a hybridization of her visual patterns and motifs (her "visual DNA") with ecological entities encompassing both living and non-living things.

The machine learning algorithms generated in this way function like layers of paint, creating unique hybrid images that reference real objects while also presenting abstract forms, colors, and patterns. These images, which merge contrasting elements, evoke a visual effect of swelling or bursting into the shapes of living beings on the surface of the work, similar to cellular differentiation. In the Mesh Paintings series, the mesh material used creates visual effects akin to holograms by utilizing properties such as light reflection, distortion, transparency, and layering, resulting in images that appear differently depending on the viewpoint. Through these algorithm-based painting experiments, Yi challenges the authorship and mythology of the painter. Is it possible to create a painting without the physical presence of the artist? How might machine intelligence influence the evolution of painting? Can the subjective and embodied aspects of painting be performed by machines? How can machines complement the entire process of painting, from theme setting to physical implementation, titling, and installation? Furthermore, can we eventually understand painting not just as a product of an individual but as an ecosystem in which materials, bodies, microorganisms, and machines all participate in creation and production?

Lee Ufan's Dialogue series is a body of work that reflects his artistic characteristics well, fostering profound communication between the viewer and the artwork through the use of emptiness and interaction. The work utilizes space and emptiness to reveal the boundary between existence and non-existence, emphasizing brushstrokes within the broad negative space. The simple brushstrokes and dots, which convey depth within simplicity, are repetitive, but each line and dot accumulates energy and tension, imparting profound philosophical meaning.

Furthermore, the organic brushstrokes that express harmony with nature and the gradual accumulation that reflects time and repetition capture the flow of time in the artwork. Through these elements, the viewer is led to experience a meditative contemplation on time and existence.

Most importantly, the concept of relationship and interaction is at the core of the Dialogue series, creating a space of dialogue where the gaze and response between the viewer and the artwork interact. This provides the viewer with an experience of participation and communion with the work. Lee Ufan's Dialogue goes beyond simple visual beauty to explore the relationship between humanity, nature, and time, offering the viewer a meditative and reflective experience.

Richard Tuttle is an American contemporary artist known for his unique works that transcend minimalism and conceptual art. He explores the relationship between space and materials using delicate and simple forms, creating works that blur the boundaries of traditional painting and sculpture. Tuttle's works often use everyday materials such as canvas, fabric, paper, and wood, emphasizing the inherent qualities of these materials and their refined aesthetics.

His art is generally modest and simple in scale, yet contains significant emotional resonance and philosophical depth. Through visual simplicity and the imperfection of materials, Tuttle explores the beauty of form and presence in space, attempting to engage viewers in a sensory dialogue. His works often give a sense of being handcrafted, closely connected to the context of the space through precise installation and arrangement.

He works in a way that poses questions through form, color, and line, inviting viewers to actively participate in creating their own interpretation and meaning of the work. Rather than following the traditional rules of art, Tuttle focuses on experimenting with the boundaries of aesthetics and discovering the beauty of humble materials anew, leaving viewers with subtle yet profound impressions.

Vivien x 5 is a representative work by American contemporary artist Alex Katz, showcasing his unique portrait style and minimalist aesthetics. The piece features Vivien repeated five times, capturing different expressions. Katz visualizes time and perspective shifts through the repetitive arrangement of the figure, using flat forms and bright colors to portray multiple facets of the subject.

Katz's work is characterized by simplified forms and clear colors, reflecting his connection to pop art. Vivien x 5 eliminates unnecessary details, emphasizing vitality and presence through visual imagery. The different directions of Vivien's gaze induce psychological interaction with the viewer, inviting them to engage with the work.

Ultimately, Vivien x 5 explores time, change, and the viewer's relationship with the subject, presenting new possibilities for modern portraiture through its distinctive use of color and composition.

Kim Taek Sang, a prominent figure in Korean post-Dansaekhwa, creates works that establish their own unique environments. His Breathing Light series draws inspiration from the reflective properties of water and the qualities of light that arise from it. Kim's translucent paintings move away from traditional elements of painting, such as form, depiction, and narrative, instead filling the canvas with various gradations of color. He views his works as spatial structures composed of natural elements like water, light, and time, based on a balance of high intentionality and one-time chance occurrences. His works can be seen as a process that mimics and creates tension between serendipity and intention.

The artist pours a diluted acrylic solution onto the canvas, allowing the dissolved particles to settle on the surface over time. Once a layer of color has been absorbed by the canvas, he drains the remaining water and lets it dry. Kim repeats this process dozens or even hundreds of times until the surface reaches the stage of "breathing light." Through this process, the multiple layers that accumulate reveal each other while also fading. While he plays an active role in the process, he also leaves space for natural actions to influence the outcome on the canvas. In Breathing Light - Red in Red - 23-1 (2023), the dense layers of red tones impart texture and tactility to the surface. The subtle changes in color at the edges of the canvas evoke the gentle flow of water saturated with pigment, adding a sense of vibrancy and depth to the piece.

Ken Gun Min expresses sorrow, joy, and longing through vivid and dynamic paintings rendered poetically. Born in Seoul, he has continued his artistic practice in cities like San Francisco, Zurich, Berlin, and Los Angeles. Drawing from his experiences as an immigrant and his multicultural perspective, he has delved into themes that are often overlooked or marginalized. Ken intertwines historical narratives, especially those that receive little attention, with biblical and ancient mythological imagery. He also merges oil painting with traditional Korean pigments and embroidery, weaving a cross-cultural landscape on the canvas. In his latest works, he addresses his personal childhood experiences from the late 1980s, yet presents them in culturally unbounded, fantastical imagery.

2022-1988 explores personal and social relationships through two stories related to tigers from the years 1988 and 2022. During the hot summer of 1988, Ken was mobilized for mass gymnastics training for the opening and closing ceremonies of the Seoul Olympics. He had no time to question the adults' rhetoric about contributing to South Korea's progress as a developing nation; instead, he experienced the deprivation of his rights to education and freedom as a minor. The Olympic mascot, Hodori, became an image stained with the notion of personal sacrifice for the young artist. In contrast, the story from 2022 is related to the death of P-22, a mountain lion that wandered through the affluent neighborhood of Los Feliz, Los Angeles. The city cared deeply for this animal, treating it as a local legend, and its death sparked discussions on animal rights and urban planning. The Los Angeles incident evoked memories of his uncomfortable childhood trauma, prompting Ken to metaphorically open the belly of the tiger and use jewels and embroidery to explore the stories within himself.

The Scandinavian artist duo Elmgreen & Dragset have worked together on all their projects since 1995, operating out of Berlin. Their collaborative practice spans sculpture, performance, design, architecture, and theater—often blending humor with philosophical depth. Their work stems from a shared belief that the spaces and structures we inhabit are never neutral; instead, they are loaded with meanings, hierarchies, and embedded systems of control. Through this lens, the artists examine the subtle resistance and existential disquiet that define our relationship to contemporary society. Their practice continues to interrogate and expose the rigid ideologies embedded in the world around them.

Children and adolescents frequently appear in their sculptural works, evoking a sense of vulnerability, transformation, and nostalgia. A boy poised at the edge of a diving board, or one sketching alone—these ordinary scenes are reimagined through classical or monumental materials. In doing so, the artists suggest that everyday moments from childhood are just as worthy of commemoration as major historical events—deeply formative and culturally significant in their own right.

An early version of The Boy with the Drone was first unveiled in L'Addition (2024), Elmgreen & Dragset’s solo exhibition at the Musée d'Orsay in Paris. The boy's outstretched arm mirrors the gesture of Anacreon (1851), a marble sculpture by Eugène Guillaume in the museum’s permanent collection. But while Anacreon holds a cup with a perched bird, the boy in Elmgreen & Dragset’s work holds a drone—an object ready to be released, as if into the world beyond. Here, the drone functions as an extension of the body, a projection of self—both tool and metaphor for agency in an uncertain future.