Nam June Paik

Tate Liverpool 17 December 2010 – 13 March 2011



Tate Liverpool, in collaboration with FACT (Foundation for Art and Creative Technology) have curated the first major retrospective since the artist’s death, and the first exhibition of Paik’s work in the UK since 1988.
The exhibition was a great range of sculpture, video art and installation mainly revolving around ideas about technology. I found this exhibition very interesting a lot of Nam June Paiks work was about the relationship between technology and nature/spirituality like hes piece on the ground floor of the exhibition called "one candle" the piece was a closed-circuit installation with a candle, camera and five video projectors. The candle was being filmed and projected onto a wall which created a sort of meditated feel. I found myself looking at this piece for a while as it was quite relaxing. The contrast between the candle which is the oldest light source and new technology was interesting yet within the space it wasn't a hard contrast almost like the old and the new were in harmony.
On the top floor there was a section that was about "what is music" that had several pieces that looked at composed and random music. There were a few interesting looking pianos that i was told had been altered to make unusual sounds for a piano and there for who ever played it couldn't compose a song as such just arrange sound.
Another piece that i thought was interesting was an installation called TV garden which again was looking at this bizarre relationship that exists between nature and technology. There were multiple TVs scattered through a bed of plants like the one candle piece i found myself looking at this piece for a while alot of Paiks work has a medition feel about it.
A lot of the work in this exhibition interested me and it got me thinking about my own work and even made me understand my own work a little bit better.