Chan-Hyo Bae was born June 22, 1975, in Busan, South Korea. He studied Photography at Kyungsung University in South Korea. He was initially a photojournalist but then a decision to study fine art in the UK changed everything. In September 2005 he started at the Slade School of Fine Art where he was taught by John Hilliard, a world-renowned conceptual artist who uses photography. This encounter was to alter Bae's perspective and approach as he became a fine artist. Living in London for the past decade has not always been an easy experience for Bae. He has at times felt alienated and isolated; an outsider using an unfamiliar language and living in a different culture. He describes a sense of dislocation, almost disconnection. He also experienced, for the first time, racial prejudice which forced him to consider Western centric ideology that seeks to place a man like himself as ‘other’. He describes this as the Western need to “exclude and diminish differences”. This sense of ‘outsiderness’ has become a core part of his work, as has his exploration of his own identity.
He has produced a range of work using photography. His style of approach is very theatrical and staged producing large scale color prints. In his first series of work entitled Existing in Costume[1](2006-2007) there is a central subject shown in full length portrait style wearing costumes and holding objects. His next series Fairy Tales Project[2] (2008-2010) has more elaborate staged shots involving quite large props and often several characters played by actors. In Punishment Project (2011-2012) there is one main central figure, with glimpses of other people and characters in the frame. His latest series Witch Hunting Project (2013-2016) involves larger shots, often in landscape format, but in which only one main character appears along with scenes of miraculous events. Evolving across and between all these series are common concerns and themes which give a sense of his artistic voice.
Bae currently lives and primarily works in London, the UK.
Works
Culture, Prejudice and Stereotypes are explored in the work of Korean Artist Chan-Hyo Bae. Since moving into London for further studying from South Korea, He has expressed in his work the feelings of cultural and emotional estrangement he experienced in the UK. Several series with the title Existing in Costume (2006 – 2016) saw him posing in variety of female historical western costumes, integrating himself into a history and society from which he felt excluded. Researched in meticulous detail, he created elaborate scenes of himself as a noblewoman from Elizabethan to Victoria periods.
More recent work in Existing in Costume series has drawn further on the idea of placing oneself into a collective consciousness within the dimensions of nationality. He has chosen as his subject Tudor history as well as the realms of western fairytales:[3] stories that have permeated our culture and become embedded into our general psyche.
In his series, Jumping Into, Chan-Hyo Bae places himself at the center of paintings from the collection of the National Gallery in London by celebrated western painters, Titian, Rubens and Jan de Beer. He has selected paintings of Christian or Mythological subject. His historical impersonations enter the realm of the surreal, as the artist sets himself into a newly crafted animal skin patchwork painting. The paint seems to be cracking, disappearing in parts, as the artist pastes in the layers of his new composition.
From the latest work, Chan-Hyo Bae had a question asking whether absolute faith and extreme beliefs are the fundamental causes leading to the hatred and detestation, rejection and oppression, and madness and violence. He is seeking answers to this question from Occident's Eye project[4] (2019-2020). Occident's Eye exposes the reality of violence represented by absolute faith. It recognises generosity and tolerance for others and the presence of communities living in ways different from humans, and asserts we need to try to live in harmony with all living things. And He challenged the limits of photography and attempted to extend the work to multi-dimensional installations and videos.
