Artist Haegue Yang examines the cyclical sense of disconnection and fractured identities created by the migrant experience in her comprehensive solo show “Leap Year” at Migros Museum für Gegenwartskunst in Zurich. Living between Seoul and Berlin, Yang’s practice masterfully blends cultural references, finding ground exactly midway between the personal and the universal. The exhibition’s four main themes—movement, spirituality, community, and domestic life—feel like four distinct shows merged into a single space.
Entry to the gallery is through a curtain of small, ornate bells hanging from ceiling to floor. The sound resonance that spreads with visitors’ movements instantly infuses the space with an emotional atmosphere. Throughout the exhibition, Yang uses blinds and curtains to constantly interrupt the fragile line between private and public space.
Cultural Collage and Dissolved Roles
Yang’s art draws from craft traditions across geographies: “Mesmerizing Mesh” paper collages made with handmade papers from the Philippines, Poland, and Mexico, alongside straw-woven figures inspired by Korean folk art. Against these traditional techniques, she also nods to modern European minimalism; the dark blue walls on the ground floor are deliberately titled “Semi-Yves Klein Blue,” intentionally diluting the French artist’s trademark color with an “imitation” shade.
Perhaps the most poignant section is the one focused on domestic life. Yang presents an early text-based work about her relationship with her mother, Misoon Kim (a prominent writer and left-wing activist). The text revolves around an incident during her mother’s visit to Germany, when she accidentally flooded the bathroom because she didn’t know German bathrooms lack floor drains. This moment exposes the mother’s sense of cultural inadequacy and makes her dependent on the cultural knowledge her daughter has acquired. The texts narrate the unraveling of the mother’s eternal role while reflecting the universal emotion of identity fracture experienced by migrants: “My mother looked smaller to me than ever before. It hurt me deeply.”
In her “Non-Indépliables, nues” series, Yang attaches naked lightbulbs to IKEA-style drying racks, staging a contrast between the ubiquitous Swedish minimalism of Airbnb apartments and the spiritual form of the Inuit Inukshuk (Indigenous wayfinding markers). By using synthetic materials in her practice, Yang also sabotages the fetishization of traditional techniques. Her work directly addresses this very fragmentation and productive dissonance.
Exhibition Details
- Artist: Haegue Yang
- Title: Leap Year
- Venue: Migros Museum für Gegenwartskunst, Zurich
- Dates: Continues until 18 January 2026
- Themes: Migration, Identity, Community, and Spirituality
- Note: The exhibition is a comprehensive presentation of the artist’s practice to date, organized around four main themes.
