Soojin Kang

Soojin Kang’s practice is based in the exploration of textiles as a sculptural medium. Using natural dyes and hand spun yarns, Kang experiments with the evocative power of fibre to entangle the organic and the bodily with something other-than-natural. In Kang’s 2022 site-specific sculpture for jevouspropose in Zurich, forms resembling engorged anthers buckled against the clean walls of the gallery, while her Landscape installation at Ben Hunter, also in 2022, presented an infestation of the space with gargantuan larvae-like creatures, woven from crimson thread. The nutritive, wholesome allusions that handmade textile media often bears - embraced in Kang’s practice through the use of organic forms, raw edges, and earthy pigments - are shot through with traces of the monstrous. At Gathering, in her 2023 exhibition To Be You, Whoever You Are, Kang approached the human figure for the first time.

Kang was born in 1978 in Seoul, Korea and lives and works in Kulmbach, Germany. She received her MA in Textiles from Central Saint Martins in 2009. In 2017, Kang’s work Fall was acquired by the Victoria & Albert Museum, London, for the museum’s permanent collection. Her first solo exhibition was staged at UNIT 9 in 2017; more recent solo exhibitions include Forgive yourself for everything, Galerie Khoshbakht (2024), Landscape, Ben Hunter, London (2022); jevouspropose, Zurich (2022) and Between the Lines, Movement Lab, Busan (2019). Kang’s recent group exhibitions include Prophetic Dreams, Kutlesa Gallery (2024), KREATUR, Reiter Galleries, Berlin (2022); Porosity, 021 Gallery, Daegu (2021); Weave, Spinalto, Mainleus (2020), and CROP, Sarah Myerscough Gallery (2019).