To Future
Listeners Ⅲ
2025
Single-channel video, stereo sound
12 minutes 25 seconds
The song heard in the video is an Irish immigrant song recorded in the United States in the early 20th century. Originally captured on a wax cylinder in an Irish male immigrant's voice, the song is digitally transformed within the work into a choral arrangement sung by women. Most Irish women immigrants, upon arriving in the United States, were dispersed into domestic work. As they became part of the households that constantly required their presence, they found it difficult to form their own communities.
By the 19th century, women made up more than half of the immigrant population. However, historical narratives of immigration have largely been shaped by male voices and memories, leaving the presence of women and their role in shaping discourse overlooked for generations.
This work presents the process of constructing a choral voice of immigrant women—voices that were never formally recorded. It reflects on how these women existed between history and oblivion, resilience and constraint, and resistance and tradition.
(KR)
2025
Single-channel video, stereo sound
12 minutes 25 seconds
The song heard in the video is an Irish immigrant song recorded in the United States in the early 20th century. Originally captured on a wax cylinder in an Irish male immigrant's voice, the song is digitally transformed within the work into a choral arrangement sung by women. Most Irish women immigrants, upon arriving in the United States, were dispersed into domestic work. As they became part of the households that constantly required their presence, they found it difficult to form their own communities.
By the 19th century, women made up more than half of the immigrant population. However, historical narratives of immigration have largely been shaped by male voices and memories, leaving the presence of women and their role in shaping discourse overlooked for generations.
This work presents the process of constructing a choral voice of immigrant women—voices that were never formally recorded. It reflects on how these women existed between history and oblivion, resilience and constraint, and resistance and tradition.
(KR)
#1
Exhibition view of Korea Artist Prize (National Museum of Modern and Contemporary of Art, Korea, Seoul, 2025). Photo: Chulki Hong.
#2-4
Video still.
1 min video excerpt