Jo Choonman, IK200300-Onsan Industrial Complex, 2020 ⓒJo Choonman / Image courtesy of CHAPTER Ⅱ
Jo Choonman was fascinated by photography while working as a welder in his twenties, becoming a hobby but only entering Kyungil University School of Photography & Videography at the age of 40. ‘A photographer who used to be a welder at Ulsan Industrial Complex’; this single line in his profile lends authenticity to his photographs, pictures of industrial complexes and landscapes. However, his work escapes the sense of reality he has experienced as a field worker and maintains a contemplative distance. The mechanical critic Lee Youngjune praised his photographs as they offer a fresh take on the density and forms of huge industrial sites that are uncommon, defining a sharp ‘industrial aesthetics’. As proof, over the past 20 years, he has been invited to group exhibitions covering diverse themes such as industry, modernisation, history, and labour, while at the same time the subject of Jo’s work is consistently branded as ‘industry’. Is it impossible to shed light on his work other than through the lens of industry to reach other interpretations? Jo Choonman’s solo exhibition, which was held in CHAPTER Ⅱ until July 24, is a follow- up to this question. First, the word ‘industry’, which appeared 11 times in a row across the titles of the past 13 solo exhibitions, is not visible. The title of the exhibition, which brings together unpublished and existing works, is ‘Utopia’. Regarding this, Lee Youngjune explained that it was because they were filmed at a physically distance, and also because they created a world that people who lived in the industrial field could not see. An aesthetic landscape that cannot be seen by being immersed in reality has been replaced with a utopia that cannot be achieved in reality. This overlaps with Le Corbusier, who saw a cylindrical silo (granary) 100 years ago and said it was beautiful. For whom is the utopia ‘discovered’ between labour and art, industrial beauty and realism? It was disappointing to not be able to locate the answer in the exhibition.