Introduction

With subjects ranging from Alexander Rodchenko to Yvonne Rainer, and from Antony Gormley to Robert Smithson, The Object of Observation (Changes by Being Observed), curated by artist Tim Lee (b. 1975, Seoul, Korea), brings together works by Jennifer Bornstein, Abraham Cruzvillegas, Sam Durant, Ryan Gander, Mario Garcia Torres and Derek Sullivan.

Working reflexively from the past, each of the artists in the exhibition, similarly to Lee with his own work, remake, regenerate and reconsider the work of other artists in order to articulate their own artistic practice. Citing Subject Matter, Dan Graham's 1969 text that featured a survey of his artistic contemporaries as a starting point, the exhibition takes Graham's original title and uses the process of re-translation (from English "Subject Matter" to German "Betrachtungsgegenstand" and then back to English "The Object of Observation") in order to characterize the potential of a source manifesting itself in unpredictable ways and taking on an unrecognizable form.

Featuring artworks that employ strategies of abstraction, figuration, appropriation and performance, each work investigates the formal and historical legacies of previous artworks in a purposeful attempt to re-orient our perceptions of them.