Current Exhibitions on View
The Splendor of Bamboo: Japanese Contemporary Baskets
On View from March 9, 2023 to May 31, 2023
Charles B. Wang Center Skylight Gallery, Zodiac Gallery
The aesthetic beauty of woven Japanese bamboo baskets has been praised and acknowledged for centuries. To this day, bamboo baskets are an integral and cherished part of the flower arrangement (ikebana) and tea ceremony in Japan. The Charles B. Wang Center celebrates the extraordinary beauty and intricate craftsmanship of Japanese bamboo baskets with a new generation of Japanese artists who produce functional, sculptural, and refined works with their individual sensibility and creativity. Twenty-seven baskets on display reflect the longstanding basket-weaving traditions and modern transformations of Japanese basketry with advanced plaiting skills and experimentation with new shapes.
All works are on loan from Courtesy of TAI Modern.
Curated by Jinyoung A. Jin, director of cultural programs at the Charles B. Wang Center, the treasures in this exhibition take visitors on a remarkable journey across regions and time.
Exhibitions Opening Reception
Friday, March 24, 2023 @ 5:00 PM – 7:00 PM
Skylight Gallery
Free Admission
Again by Seongmin Ahn
Long-Term Installation
Charles B. Wang Center Main Lobby
Again is a typographical mural by Brooklyn-based artist Seongmin Ahn, expressing her manifesto of overcoming the global COVID-19 pandemic. The mural is a cross-cultural exchange and community bonds, and it incorporates both Eastern and Western styles, motifs, ornaments, and symbols. The ornamented images celebrates "the beginning of a prosperous future again" in various languages, including Korean, English, Spanish, Chinese, and Hindi.
The mural has been installed in various communities in New York City, including the neighborhood of Corona, Queens, an area that was hit hard by COVID-19.
The Studio:
Through a Surrealistic Lens
Long-Term Installation
Charles B. Wang Center Theatre Gallery
White, flat, dreamlike spaces, serving as thresholds between the inner, subjective self and the external, physical world, were a subject that fascinated the South Korea-based project group GREEM (a name that literally translates to “picture” in Korean). GREEM’s goal is to elicit feelings of strangeness, difference, curiosity, and fun in its audiences. Following a long and rich Surrealist tradition, GREEM draws inspiration from dreamlike narratives, absurd juxtapositions, and comic books for new graphic languages.
A huge, flattened, and cartoon-like artist’s studio in white and black is open, inviting viewers to live out their surrealistic fantasies. The realistic detailing of the artist’s studio also adds touches of humor, utility, and everyday-ness. As soon as the viewer enters the studio (which is carefully modeled and gives the illusion of a three-dimensional form), surrealistic dreams are triggered; the white, flat scene and the viewer’s point of view are disrupted.
The current exhibition is designed to be reproduced and seen on social media as much as it is meant to be enjoyed in its actual location. This imaginative exhibition crosses perspective, culture, and media.
Curated by Jinyoung Jin, Director of Cultural Programs at the Charles B. Wang Center, this exhibition is designed and presented by Project Group GREEM, based in Seoul, South Korea.
Simplicity Over Complexity
Long-Term Installation
Charles B. Wang Center Outdoor Garden
Brooklyn-based Korean American artist Jongil Ma revives the Charles B. Wang Center's outdoor garden with architecturally woven sculptures, using varying lengths and types of thin wooden strips, both in their raw state and dyed in color. Three large, site-specific installations balance the positive with the negative, tranquility with tension, and stillness with movement. The installations interact with the Wang Center's architecture and spatial dynamics, transforming the garden through a multiplicity of viewing possibilities.
* The Charles B. Wang Center's exterior garden was cleaned up by Pi Lambda Phi Fraternity as part of their community service. A special thanks to Ahmed Shata, Andrew Zheng, Omar Sandresy, Dan Monessa, Dhaval Shah, and Brian Crosby.
Zen Rock Garden
Long-Term Installation
Charles B. Wang Center Outdoor Garden
Located on the first floor, in between the meeting rooms 101 and 102 at the Charles B. Wang Center, this Japanese rock garden (枯山水 karesansui) was created by Gerard Senese and his wife Hiroko Uraga-Senese as a tribute to the appreciation of Japanese culture. Japanese gardens are rich with symbolism, and they are usually created with certain meanings and wishes in mind. The Wang Center's new Zen garden features symbols of Buddhist paradises with a tortoise islet (kame-jima) and a crane islet (tsuru-jima). Made with rocks, the tortoise symbolizes prosperity and the crane symbolizes health and good luck.