Lee Bul’s ‘Long Tail Halo’: A New Artistic Journey at the Metropolitan Museum of Art

Lee Bul’s Artistic Journey and Recent Inspirations

“Oh, I have another story!” the artist Lee Bul exclaimed, her laughter echoing during a recent interview. “Always with the stories, always with the drama.” Over the past year, while crafting four enigmatic sculptures destined to adorn the facade niches of the Metropolitan Museum of Art in Manhattan, she encountered a series of challenges that could easily fill a narrative of its own. “I joked that it’s some kind of sinbyeong,” she explained, referring to a phenomenon in Korean tradition where a god possesses a potential shaman. Just last week, she experienced an unexpected ordeal: “I got bitten by a giant centipede.” At her home nestled in the mountains of Seoul, the sensation on her left heel was “like being pierced by a nail.”

“It feels like a hint or a prophecy,” Lee reflected during our video call, with the assistance of an interpreter. This conversation took place in early August, as she dedicated herself to her studio just outside the capital city, working six days a week to finalize her creations ahead of their unveiling on September 12 in New York. “This pain heals the pain of sculpting,” she remarked, referencing the bite as a transformative experience.

Such anecdotes are quintessentially Lee Bul: marked by a wry humor and candidness, yet imbued with an intriguing ambiguity and an unwavering resolve. Throughout her illustrious career, she has produced radical performances, intricate sculptures, and installations that interrogate outdated visions of the future, alongside poetic abstract paintings in more recent years. Now at the age of 60, she stands as one of South Korea’s most esteemed artists.

Long Tail Halo: A New Artistic Endeavor

For her project titled “Long Tail Halo,” the fifth iteration of the Met’s prestigious Facade Commission, Lee has ventured into rich yet tumultuous new territory. She artfully merges figurative and abstract elements to create a quartet of uncanny beings that defy the expectations set by previous editions of the series. These sculptures not only reference the museum’s extensive collection but also challenge the conventional perceptions of how art should manifest and interact within public spaces.

During the interview, Bul, with her striking bright white hair, was situated in her expansive studio, dressed in an apron adorned with pens over a neatly buttoned black shirt. Behind her, a team of studio assistants—numbering between 10 to 15 during the Met project—busily made subtle adjustments to the sculptures. Towering at nearly 10 feet, these creations feature intricate skeletons built from a complex lattice of perforated stainless-steel strips, reminiscent of avant-garde Erector sets. To complete their unique visual language, the sculptures will be embellished with angular components crafted from polycarbonate and acrylic, as well as skins made from acetate sheets.