Sep 17, 2021–Jul 10, 2022

Na Kim FFC on 6, 7, 8

Na Kim, FFC on 6, 7, 8, 2021. Installation view, Institute of Contemporary Art, University of Pennsylvania. Photo by Constance Mensh.
About

ICA announces a new series, OUTSIDE IN, that will visually transform ICA’s 36th Street façade, a space that has a distinct presence, to be experienced both by passersby from the vantage of the street and by visitors within ICA’s ramp space gallery. With each iteration, ICA will select from an interdisciplinary range of artists, poets, and designers and invite them to collaborate with Maharam—a forward-thinking textile company based in New York known for their innovative graphic wall installations and commitment to design. Each commission will provide the invited artist with the opportunity to work with Maharam’s unique materials and production expertise to create a site-specific artwork that welcomes publics from multiple vantage points and animates ICA’s building in unexpected ways.

To launch the OUTSIDE IN series with Maharam, ICA has invited the conceptually-driven graphic designer Na Kim who works between Seoul and Berlin. Known for her use of bold colors, shapes, and patterns inspired by everyday life, her work often expands beyond the page and into the creation of dynamic installations and environments. Na Kim studied with legendary Dutch designer Karel Martens at the Werkplaats Typografie and since 2016 has been a member of the Alliance Graphique Internationale (AGI). From 2009—2011 she was responsible for the concept and design of GRAPHIC magazine and has exhibited her work at venues including MMCA and SeMA, Seoul; the Victoria & Albert Museum, London; MoMA, New York, and the Triennale Milano, Milan.

Maharam Digital Projects, is a division within Maharam that produces large-scale wall installations and more recently developed an innovative technology to cover glass. They have worked closely with artists such as Spencer Finch, Sarah Sze, Marilyn Minter, Liam Gillick, Teresita Fernández, Polly Apfelbaum, designers such as Hella Jongerius and Karel Martens, and fashion designers such as Paul Smith.

Adèle Naudé Santos and Na Kim in conversation

Watch Na Kim join architect Adèle Naudé Santos in conversation with ICA Dorothy and Stephen R. Weber (CHE ’60) Curator Alex Klein to ruminate on where their practices connect in Santos’s original design of ICA’s building.

Kim, who often works with found compositions she encounters in everyday objects, was inspired by Santos’s desire to bridge the space between the ICA art galleries with life on the street. In Kim’s site-specific installation, produced in collaboration with Maharam, Santos’s vision is celebrated and realized anew.