Mire Lee: Black Sun

Machinery and organism merge in Lee’s sculptural explorations of bodily function and environmental decay

Published on the occasion of Mire Lee’s (born 1988) first American solo museum exhibition, this publication brings together Lee’s recent architectural environments and kinetic sculptures. Composed of materials including low-tech motors, pumping systems, steel rods and PVC hoses filled with grease, glycerin, silicone, slip and oil, Lee’s animatronic sculptures operate both like living organisms and biological machines. Drawing references from architecture, horror, pornography and cybernetics, and evoking bodily functions and environmental decay, Lee offers a visceral means to describe properties that exist between the realms of the technological and the corporeal: tenderness, desire, abjection, anxiety and revulsion, among other states. In the past year, Lee has had institutional solo exhibitions at MMK Frankfurt and Kunstmuseum Den Haag, Netherlands, and has participated in major international exhibitions including the 59th Venice Biennale, the 58th Carnegie International, and Busan Biennial 2022.