Genesis and The Met open first exhibition under partnership

The inaugural exhibition under the partnership between Genesis and The Metropolitan Museum of Art, “The Genesis Facade Commission: Lee Bul, Long Tail Halo,” opened on the 16th at the museum in New York City.

Launched in 2019, the Facade Commission is a signature contemporary art series at The Met that presents large-scale installations by a newly selected artist on the museum’s facade. Beginning this year, the series will be presented as “The Genesis Facade Commission” through the partnership between Genesis and The Met.

※ Facade: the front exterior wall of a building

Located on Fifth Avenue, one of Manhattan’s best-known thoroughfares, the exhibition can also be viewed from outside the museum. Genesis expects it to inspire a wider global audience.

Lee Bul, the first artist featured in The Genesis Facade Commission, is considered one of the leading contemporary artists of her generation. Since the late 1980s, she has explored visions of utopia and the sweeping course of history through sculpture, painting, performance, installation and other media.

For “The Genesis Facade Commission: Lee Bul, Long Tail Halo,” the artist presents four large-scale new installations that revisit humanity’s long-standing desire for “perfection.”

The new works comprise two human-like figures and two animal forms. Using materials such as polycarbonate, Lee employed her signature labor-intensive approach, crafting the pieces by hand.

The two human-like figures, positioned on either side of the museum’s main entrance, combine forms that evoke works in The Met’s collection, including Greek and Roman art, Cubism and Futurism. On pedestals nearby, two animal figures—drawing on the artist’s companion animals, which served as her guardians—crouch atop cascades of fragmented, prism-like pieces.

Each work stands alone while appearing to engage with the others. Together, they express humanity’s enduring aspiration for progress and perfection, while also suggesting the trials and imperfections inherent in that pursuit.

The exhibition, which features the artist’s new work, runs through May 27 next year.

Max Hollein, director and CEO of The Metropolitan Museum of Art, said, “Lee Bul’s work explores human complexity through powerful, hybrid forms drawn from the past, addressing our expectations for the present and fears about the future. We are delighted that the Genesis Facade Commission gives the artist the opportunity to engage with and challenge the museum’s Fifth Avenue facade.”

In conjunction with the exhibition’s opening, a range of programs will offer audiences multiple ways to engage with the artist’s work. On the 12th, “An Evening with Artist Lee Bul” will look back at her career and feature an in-depth conversation about the new works. On the 14th, visitors can view the exhibition and create their own figures at “Open Studio – Futuristic Figure.”

Genesis said the first exhibition of The Genesis Facade Commission will invite audiences to reconsider conventional norms and values through Lee Bul’s ongoing, boundary-pushing artistic exploration. The company hopes to offer audiences around the world a profound experience that transcends the boundaries of space and time.

Genesis is also launching a global arts initiative and plans to continue supporting cultural and artistic projects that uncover enduring values and meaning. In May next year, it will sponsor “The Genesis Exhibition: Do Ho Suh” at Tate Modern in London, continuing to develop its distinctive art partnerships.