DOOSAN Art Center DOOSAN Gallery presents GAME I, a Solo Exhibition by Jungsuck Kang, the recipient of the 6th DOOSAN Yonkang Arts Awards, from Nov 23rd to Dec 24th, 2016. Kangʹs work captures the everyday life of his close friends on video and explores the uncertainties and imperfections of contemporary life. Through this exhibition, Kang attempts to capture reality through games, and takes off from his past works such as the observations on the labor and life of his friend who works at a game company - an idea explored in his Solo Exhibition at Insa Art Space in 2014 - and the concept of ʹinstant dungeonʹ in the game world by connecting many spaces in another Solo Exhibition by the artist.
GAME I is an actual game, consisting of videos and images which Kang found on the internet or produced himself. Videos which cannot be controlled is defined as game, because recently, game play is changing from the game player controlling the game with keyboard, mouse and joy stick, to watching internet game broadcasts. Also, with popularization of smartphones and rapid development of digital technology, the boundary between reality and games pursuing virtual reality is collapsing and reality itself is becoming a game. The number of steps taken per day, hear beats, and matters of interest are saved as data, creating a new entity online like a character in a game. This being is gathered more information online, changes, comes to make his or her own judgments, and becomes a living entity in the game world. Ultimately, looking at and creating images and videos online reflects controlling oneself in a big game of reality.

Kang shows his own game through a clearing method called ʹspeed runʹ in his video work GAME I: Speedrun Any % PB. The title of the work refers to the Personal Best(Record), which means the score of the player clearing the game from start to finish in speedrun. ʹSpeedrunʹ is a way of gameplay which runs over the entire game - which was intended for the player to enjoy the narrative or nurture and grow the characters - in the shortest time like a racing game. Itʹs another form of play thatʹs different from the given system and method, and signifies life attitude. However, this is inevitably a limited and incomplete attempt because even all this takes place in the massive framework of game, and these attempts donʹt arrive at a perfect 100% but coincidentally happen to arrive at a certain point.

In this exhibition, Kang proposes the special target of GAME I, taking off from the idea of Personal Best(PB) and history of games. Kang proposes the new players of GAME I questions on the possibility of independent judgment and thinking in the conditions of mixed reality and fantasy.

Jungsuck Kang(b. 1984) received his B.F.A. in Fine Arts from Korea National University of Arts. He has held Solo Exhibitions at Insa Art Space(Seoul, KR, 2014) and Seoul Art Space Seogyo(Seoul, KR, 2013). He has also participated in group exhibitions at venues that include Ilmin Museum of Art(2015, Seoul, KR), Nowhere(2015, Seoul, KR), 800/40(2015, Seoul, KR), Trading Post(2014, Seoul, KR), Audio Visual Pavilion(2014, Seoul, KR), HITE Collection(2014, Seoul, KR) and Art Space Pool(2013, Seoul, KR).