The human body and its forms are the main theme of the Korean artist Seo Young Deok‘s work. Dystopia, his solo exhibition which took place at the INSA / Arko Art Center in Seoul, showed his meticulous and fascinating work, sculptures of nudes made from metal chains, welded together piece by piece. Human bodies, whole or severed, made by fixing mainly bicycle chains, sometimes shiny and almost alive, other times corroded, melted, rusty.

His works seem to send a critical message towards industrialization and the human condition. They convey anguish and helplessness. The inability to free oneself from an inextinguishable weight, from a constricting and paralyzing inner discomfort.

Deok‘s work is partly reminiscent of that of the English sculptor Antony Gormley. At the center of their research is the study of the human figure and an intimate reflection on the consciousness of one’s body and one’s vulnerability.