Existing in Costume – Chan Hyo Bae

mc2gallery opens the exhibition season with the exhibition of Chan-Hyo Bae, an artist born in South Korea, in Busan, in 1975. He lives and works in London: as an immigrant then, in the series “Existing in Costume”, he disguises himself with costumes of epoch and photographs himself as a (female) member of an English-born aristocracy of the thirteenth / nineteenth century or re-interprets the most famous Western fairy tales. His self-portraits imitate the English monarchs and are a work on identity, power, race and class distinction. Chan-Hyo Bae wants to undermine the prejudices of Western culture towards other cultures: from childhood we are used, through fairy tales, to identify predefined roles, between “winners” and losers, good and bad, losers and rulers. Chan-Hyo Bae, through its being Asian, creates a short circuit in the recognition of the protagonists starting from the most famous fairy tales (Cinderella or La bella la e la bestia). “The attempt to become British is for me like a child trying to dress like an adult,” he says. Chan-Hyo Bae tries to become British just as a child pretends to be his mother, to dress his clothes, using his cosmetics. Even if the mother’s clothes are not suitable for a child, he tries to express his existence as another person. A strong affirmation of identity, for those who as immigrants seek proof of their existence in the world with the attempt to be accepted by a culture that does not belong to them. An aesthetic and amusing work that hides depths and strong themes, whispered and hidden behind the makeup of the perfect sets that Chan-Hyo recreates for his shots.