Jiae Hwang

by Luisa Lagos

WORKS FROM THE SERIES I AM THE REAL PRINCESS OF THE MAGICAL LAND

Jiae Hwang presents clothing as an icon of subversion, suggesting that clothing may quite possibly be the best way to subversive today. In her current exhibition, I AM THE REAL PRINCESS OF THE MAGICAL LAND, Hwang explores the mechanism of confrontation both as image (power, youth, hope, uncanny innocence) and as a statement of individualism or standardization.

In these works, the artist celebrates and neutralizes reality by deploying a weapon of cartoon-like figures (anime) to reinterpret the universal image of school girls uniforms, which function both as an homage and as a utopian conceptualization of change. Mixing and matching symbols (uniforms, young innocent looking girls, cartoon images), the artist offers a complex system of meaning, refusing to take a precise moral or ideological position. At the same time, the line drawings suggest the thin line that separates innocence and disturbance: They resonate with the artist’s previous works such as the performance It only hurts for a moment (Basel-Miami 2002), in which three girls, the paper dolls, show up in 70 pastel-colored nurse gowns, and "butt seriously..." (Moore Building, Miami, 2002), a series of whimsical line drawings depicting a superhero girl killing her identical rival, entitled, Now I will be the only one for you.

Hwang’s choice to depict girls as fictional characters with unusual powers evokes the utopian reality offered by popular cartoon superheroes, as well as the struggle for freedom from a unified society that doesn’t allow for individualism. The girls are not a simple school girls; they are holding scepters. Hwang‘s use of graph paper evokes a mechanically designed, mathematically oriented environment and emphasizes uniformity and standardization, paralleling the structures enforced by educational institutions and norms for women in Asia. Just as fashion designers perpetually put their own spins on traditional roles, Hwang spins traditional uniforms by changing one small detail: Each girl hero holding a scepter is as proud as an ordinary girl who one day realizes she has magical powers to change the world: She can take a risk. The caption reads: I am the queen of a magical world.

The sense of alienation and defiance under the cuteness of the faces conveys a mix of contradictions in style and substance: the girl heroes look a bit uncomfortable under the skin, but their eyes radiate youthful optimism. Her innocence carries within it the capacity to turn uneasy, uncanny, or sexually deviant. The image is one of innocence turning menacing: Magical power is subversive when in the hands of an angelical figure; something is going to happen.