Nam June Paik in New York · Part One
Nam June Paik - Zen for TV - 1963–90
From 24 May to 22 July 2022, Gagosian Gallery presents in New York the first part of "Art in Progress", an exhibition of the work of the South Korean artist Nam June Paik (1932-2006), a pioneer of video art.
Source: Gagosian Gallery · Image: Nam June Paik, 'Zen for TV', 1963-90, manipulated 19-inch colour television and acrylic paint, 49.5 × 43.2 × 43.2 cm (19 1/2 × 17 × 17 inches) © Nam June Paik Estate
In 2015, Gagosian Gallery acquired the rights to represent the legacy of Nam June Paik (1932-2006), one of the great pioneers of video art, organising in Hong Kong  the exhibition "The Late Style", the artist's first at the gallery. Seven years later, Paik returns to the gallery, this time in New York, with an exhibition organised in two parts, the first of which opens today. Following this first part of "Art in Progress", Gagosian Gallery will present the second part of the exhibition at a nearby venue from 19 July to 26 August.
The gallery explains that “melding an early training in classical music and subsequent interest in musical composition with radical, collaborative approaches to aesthetics and performance, Paik produced multimedia works that introduced the technology of television into the realm of fine art”, adding that “the first part of the exhibition surveys Paik’s practice as it developed over four decades. On view is a diverse selection of work ranging from early forays into multimedia to late paintings and video sculptures. The ‘Opus Paintings’ (1975)—a suite of small oil-on-canvas works scattered across the gallery wall—render the familiar, rotund form of the classic television set in fluid brushstrokes and weightless aerial suspension. Titled as a tribute to the location of his Manhattan studio, ‘359 Canal Street’ (1991) evokes the image of the artist’s workspace through an old-fashioned desk filled with newspaper clippings and letters from Paik’s associates, while cathode ray tubes affixed to the wall above conjure the generative power of a technologically interconnected world. The second part of ‘Art in Process’, at Gagosian’s Park & 75 gallery, will feature Paik’s trio of satellite broadcasts from the 1980s as well as a number of his intimate and elegiac “late style” televisions.”

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