Perry Rubenstein Gallery is pleased to present a multi-media exhibition by Korean artist Jeon Joonho. Widely recognized in Asia, this exhibition marks his first solo show in the U.S. Jeon’s socio-political works explore the complex relationship between South Korea and the United States. Having studied both in Korea and the United States, Jeon’s work carries a familiarity with American imagery and subject matter.

Jeon has created his first multi-channel video for his New York debut that takes over the 527 West 23rd Street space. Each of the 5 computer animations exists on their own, yet when presented altogether, expand and take a different shape, both literally and figuratively. In one, an anime character is left crying after a brief encounter in a hotel room, the score resembling the music played in a Hitchcock film just before the climactic moment. Another shows a line drawing of General MacArthur, notorious leader of the United Nations Command forces that defended South Korea against North Korea’s invasion in the 1950s, repeating the same phrase (“I shall return”). The cacophony of sound and image create a chaos that at the same time achieves a conceptual harmony.

The 534 West 24th Street gallery will feature the 2006 work The White House, first exhibited at the Mori Art Museum. Jeon digitally renders a shadowy figure into the unmistakable imagery identified on the reverse of the American twenty-dollar bill. At seven-minutes and twenty seven seconds, the video depicts an anonymous individual laboring to erase or ‘white-wash’ out the windows of the U.S. White House, eventually leaving the iconic building completely effaced.

Jeon’s dark though playful examination of Americana continues at 526 West 24th Street with Player 13, a larger-than-life bronze sculpture of a football player mid-stride. Isolating and magnifying the single figure and single action, the sculpture is in fact complete with an engine that, when turned on, emits smoke and the raucous groan of a machine.

Jeon has exhibited internationally, most notably with Arario Gallery in Beijing, the Shanghai Duolun Museum, Victoria Miro Gallery in London and at the Seoul Museum of Art. Jeon lives and works in Busan, Korean.