Curated by Younggi P. Tanaka 

As the fourth exhibition in Alpha Contemporary’s opening series Korean Contemporary “Now” and “Next,” Japanese and Korean Contemporary “Next” vol.3: Get Drunk presents works by Kanako Ohya and Ryoungjae Jung.

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 The series Korean Contemporary “Now” introduces the current Korean art scene through mid-career artists active both in Korea and internationally.
In contrast, Korean Contemporary “Next” focuses on the next generation of expression, highlighting artists of the same generation from Korea and Japan, primarily born in the 1980s.

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 This exhibition is inspired by the prose poem Enivrez-vous (Get Drunk) by the French poet Charles Baudelaire.

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 In this text, Baudelaire urges us to remain constantly intoxicated in order to escape the crushing weight of time—the tyrant that bends our shoulders and governs our lives. Whether through wine, poetry, or virtue, each person entrusts themselves to intoxication in their own way, as a means of enduring everyday reality.

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 Kanako Oya (Japanese, b.1983) creates psychological landscapes that drift between reality and fantasy, evoking the sensation of a waking dream. Her compositions, dominated by red and orange hues, function as both a boundary and a passage between the viewer and the pictorial space, where the real and the imaginary, the ordinary and the unreal, seamlessly intermingle. Within these painted worlds, one senses both the instability inherent in intoxication and an irresistible desire to remain within it.

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 By contrast, Ryoungjae Jeong (Korean, b.1984) explores the relationship between the body and jewelry through the combined use of 3D printing technology and traditional metalworking techniques. Chains digitally replicated in vast numbers are output as indeterminate clusters, taking form only through the wearer’s body, movement, and gravity. Made of elastic polyamide, these chains respond sensitively to even the slightest bodily motion, swaying, flowing, and shimmering as they continuously change shape. Their light vibrations and vivid colors evoke a sense of exhilaration and playfulness, recalling the subtle excitement felt at the beginning of a celebration or party. The works are completed through the presence of the viewer or wearer.
Through bodily sensation, moments of pleasure, tension, and fleeting intoxication emerge, further expanding the meaning of the work.

In an intensely private space, when one is able—even briefly—to become intoxicated by the trivialities of daily life or by oneself, the oppressive weight of time momentarily loosens its grip.
 

 Through the sensation of intoxication, this exhibition offers an alternative perspective from which to confront reality.

 

 Are we, at this moment, intoxicated by something?

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 Kanako Ohya graduated from the Department of Painting, Faculty of Fine Arts, Tokyo Zokei University in 2006, and completed her MFA in Painting at Tokyo University of the Arts in 2008. She received the Grand Prize at the Gunma Biennale for Young Artists in 2008 and was selected for the Excellence Award at the 28th Sompo Japan Art Foundation Exhibition in 2009.
Her works are included in the collections of major Japanese institutions, including the Museum of Modern Art, Gunma.

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 Ryungjae Jung is currently based in Korea. After completing his MFA in Metal Craft at Kookmin University in 2016, he has participated in solo exhibitions, group exhibitions, and art fairs across Korea, Europe, the United States, China, Japan, and Taiwan. He has received awards in the fields of craft and jewelry in the United States, Korea, Spain, and Italy. His works are held in the collections of major institutions such as the Seoul Museum of Craft Art and the Deutsches Technikmuseum in Berlin.

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One must always be drunk.
That is all there is to it.
In order not to feel the horrible burden of Time,
which breaks your shoulders and bends you to the earth,
you must be continually drunk.

On wine, on poetry, or on virtue—
as you wish.

— Charles Baudelaire, Enivrez-vous (Get Drunk)