Young In Hong looks at the fragility of identity in the face of rapid change. Her monumental embroidered tableaux stitch together disconnected images as a means of probing the processes of decontextualisation. By re-framing familiar images and motifs into irrational contexts, Young In explores the idea of “fluid identity” – as if the individual were cut adrift on the sea of references that the city continuously throws up. In her video piece she shifts focus to the concept of the community, in this instance of a former Korean mining town where the government established a casino to revitalise the economy. Invited to march across the town wearing bright orange, the Miners’ Orange parade depicted a collective identity caught in the teeth of a grand economic agenda. At both individual and communal levels, Young In uses her work to question the idea of continuity within an environment of constant change.
