The Amorepacific Museum of Art presents LAWRENCE WEINER: UNDER THE SUN, a solo museum survey of the remarkable American artist Lawrence Weiner. Weiner was born in New York City in 1942, where he lived and worked throughout his life until his passing in 2021. He is considered a founding figure of the Conceptual art movement, which emerged in the 1960s amid the postwar art movements in Europe and the United States. Weiner considered his work sculpture with variable dimensions. He tacitly outlined the material potentialities of language—his primary material—describing his work as, ‘language + the materials referred to’. The breadth of his artistic practice is evidenced by his numerous artist’s books, edition works, music, films and videos. This exhibition is both Weiner’s inaugural solo presentation in South Korea as well as the artist’s first comprehensive show within an institutional context since his death.

The exhibition introduces a wide array of Weiner’s works. Besides installations on the walls and floors of the museum, it includes editions, drawings, posters, cartoons and videos that collectively illustrate his extensive artistic practice. The language of Lawrence Weiner is not confined to any specific context nor to a prescribed meaning or presentation. It remains open to personal and collective interpretations that operate within and sensitively respond to the specificities of the culture in which his works are located at any given time. Under the themes of “Subject-Object’, ‘Process’ and ‘Simultaneous Realities’, this exhibition attempts to create a space for new visual dialogues that transcend historical time and cultural space by bringing together Weiner’s art with select pieces from our Korean art collection. Weiner’s language functions both as the point of entry and departure to engage with these works. Befittingly with this context, 7 works have been translated into Korean and have been collectively installed with their English original language.

Amorepacific Museum of Art sincerely hopes that his words, when presented in this context, provide an occasion where our attitudes towards history, culture and the world can be challenged and expanded.