20 Feb 2022

Artist Yona Lee has a thing about steel pipes

From Standing Room Only, 2:48 pm on 20 February 2022

Artist Yona Lee uses hundreds of metres of stainless-steel pipe - the sort more commonly turned into handrails - for her room-sized gallery installations.  Then she adds everyday objects like umbrellas, lamps, chairs and even beds, to give the work a surrealist twist.

An Arrangement for 5 Rooms is the South Korean-born artist's most ambitious solo exhibition to date, taking over a large chunk of the Auckland Art Gallery.

The maze-like sculpture is immense.  It extends from the glassed area of the gallery into Tāmaki Makaurau's Albert Park, where it becomes a very public art work. 

Visitors can look at the pipe structures, they can interact with them - even take a nap on one of the beds!

Yona, (yo-nah) moved to Aotearoa from South Korea to study art.  Since then, her creations have been exhibited in galleries around the country and overseas. 

Lynn Freeman asks her why she chose stainless steel as her art medium of choice.

An Arrangement for 5 Rooms opens at Auckland Art Gallery on the 26th of February