Kyungah Ham

Kyung-Ah Ham (born 1966) is a contemporary multi-media artist working in Seoul. Her works utilize handmade North Korean textiles to discuss the social and political complexities between South and North Korea.

Early life and education

Kyung-Ah Ham was born in 1966 in Seoul. Growing up, unofficial political propaganda sent from North Korea by helium balloons often appeared around Ham's parents' house in Seoul. As a child, Ham could turn in these pamphlets to her school for a reward. A pamphlet discovered by Ham in 2008 of former supreme leader of North Korea Kim Jong-il rekindled Ham's interest in the function of art and material as a form of unsanctioned communication.

Ham received her B.F.A. at Seoul National University (1989). Her undergraduate work highlights the ways power is abused through videos, sculptures, photographs and an assortment of installations. She earned an M.F.A. from the School of Visual Arts in New York in 1995.

Notable works

Kyung-Ah Ham's large body of multimedia work considers power, communication, and anonymity. Her works typically sell at prices ranging from $25,000 to $300,000. Her solo work has been shown at galleries such as Room with a View, Gallery Loop, Seoul (1999), Such Games, Ssamzie Space, Seoul (2008), and Desire and Anesthesia, Artsonje Center, Seoul (2009). She has participated in group shows held at: British Museum, London (2005), Musee Palais de Tokyo, Paris (2010), Stiftung Ludwig Wein, Vienna (2010), National Museum of Modern and Contemporary Art, Gwacheon, Korea (travelled to Kunstmuseum Bonn, 2013), and Kunsthalle Düsseldorf (2014). She also participated in the 9th Guangdong Triennial (2012) and 7th Liverpool Biennial (2012). However, disinterested in selling, Ham prefers to lend her work to exhibitions or sell them to museums, and she has admitted that she keeps much of her work for herself.

Museum Display (2010)

An installation at The British Museum in 2010 considered how artists can contribute to the decolonization of the museum wall. Ham's collection of stolen objects from museums around the world includes forks, saucers, knives, vases, and salt and pepper shakers. Each object was displayed in a glass case under lights with extensive labels and a sign on the wall noted “Sign, ‘These doors are alarmed.’

Needling Whisper, Needle Country/SMS Series in Camouflage (2015)

Embroideries contain short text as a message to her artisans and viewers. The series includes works like “Big Smile,” created during the Mass Games, and “Are you lonely, too?” as a response to pressure from galleries to outsource her labor to China for convenience.

What you see is the unseen/Chandeliers for Five Cities (2016)

An ongoing project started in 2016 of five chandeliers assembled in South Korea with silk and cotton textiles handmade by anonymous artists in North Korea. The five chandeliers in this show represent the five cities of the participating countries of the 1945 Potsdam Declaration. These chandeliers symbolize the division of foreign powers that divided Korea in 1945, all of which have fallen as represented by the embroidered chandeliers positioned on the floor of the gallery space.

Ham's process begins with a digitized censored pattern that she sends to female artists in North Korea with the help of Chinese and Russian mediators. The images and content she highlight often would be removed from the public by North Korean officials but circulate freely in South Korea. A group of anonymous artisans is paid to convert her patterns into embroideries, using bright silk thread and exquisitely fine stitching. Receiving textiles from North Korea can take up to a year and a half as they are smuggled back to her using her intermediaries and bribed officials in both North and South Korea. Ham acquires the embroideries folded up in a black plastic bag, reeking of cigarette smoke. Ham notes that the colors of the silk thread used are often very unexpectedly bright, which she considers may help the artisans as they work in dimly lit facilities. After she receives the pieces, she unfolds and spreads the fabrics out in her studio before she begins to affix them to Southern-made chandelier frames. Her work is shown and sold internationally. Each hand-embroidered image contains a label that lists the materials used, the number of hours the work took, and other factors of the creative process like ‘censorship’ and ‘ideology’. Ham's embroideries are also notably influenced by recorded footage of Pyongyang's specialty-realist Mass Games.

Controversies and reception

Hams's use of illegal outsourced labor puts her at high risk as the artist and negotiator of these transactions. Both Ham and her team of anonymous female artisans could face extreme consequences for these transactions. Ham could be criminally persecuted for her facilitation, and those working for her in North Korea could face unjust imprisonment or execution for their contributions. Some of Kyungah Ham's works have been confiscated by North Korean Authorities, and Ham cites several patterns sent to North Korea that were edited and censored by those working for her.

Personal life

Ham's spoken publicly about the effects of this project on her mental health, in addition to the experiences and feelings she has listed under project labels. The Embroidery Project, which involves illegal cash transactions, bribes, and intermediaries has made stress a permanent fixture in her life.

Out of necessity, Ham has become protective over her image and the details of her process. Available sources that cite Ham specifically are reviewed by Ham before publication, and she declines most press coverage.